


Shattered Mirror

by eliddell



Category: Slayers (Anime & Manga)
Genre: (everyone except Val and Gaav is pretty minor though), Action, Adventure, Amnesia, Drama, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Post-Canon, here i go again
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-12
Updated: 2017-10-08
Packaged: 2018-12-27 06:00:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 26
Words: 88,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12074949
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eliddell/pseuds/eliddell
Summary: "For as long as I can remember, I've felt intense guilt about . . . something.  I don't know what, or why.  Sometimes I wake up screaming from nightmares that I can't remember."Being reincarnated isn't always that much fun if you don't know what went wrong the first time.  It's even less fun when you can't stop being the Priest-General of the Dark Lord who's now following you around.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Eh, I don't even know what to say about this one. It just popped into my head one day and absorbed a few ideas that didn't fit in with any of the other Val/Gaav stories I've been writing. It didn't even have a title until I forced one on it at the final proofreading stage.
> 
> Disclaimer: _The Slayers_ belongs to Hajime Kanzaka and whomever he may have sublicensed it to, not me.

The figure on the bed flung up one hand with a groan, and the high priest watched with disturbed fascination as the skin briefly became black and scaled, clouding over like the sky before a storm, before it returned to normal. 

"Just what is going on here?" he asked the one of the men standing by his side, who wore the white robes of a healer. 

The healer grimaced and pushed his half-moon glasses back up his nose. "He seems to have collapsed due to overwork and insufficient self-care. Right now, he's running a high fever. There isn't much we can do except keep casting Grey Buster on him and hope that will keep it down." 

"Is that all that's wrong with him?" That was the novice-master, with her plain brown working robes and grey hair done up in a no-nonsense bun. 

The healer sighed. "Physically, yes, or at least that's our best guess right now." 

"Your best _guess_?" 

"I don't know a lot about non-human diseases, Doria. If I'd known we had a dragon as a novice, I would have read up a bit." 

The novice-master winced. "I didn't know he was non-human either. He never said anything. And from your phrasing, I take it that you think there's something non-physical wrong with him." 

"Oh, yes." The healer scowled and lifted his delirious patient's arm, turning it over to show the underside. 

"Ceiphied preserve us," the high priest said, staring at the reddened scars striping the young man's skin. "What happened to him?" 

"I think these were self-inflicted." 

" _What?_ " Doria was gripping two bunched-up handfuls of her robe's skirts. 

"There are multiple layers of scarring, built up over a period of time. These most recent injuries must date from after he arrived here. There are signs of damage in other places too, primarily his sides and outer thighs. As though he's been clawing at himself. Since he doesn't have any parasites or skin diseases I was able to find, I have to assume the motivation was psychological. What do you know about him?" 

"Val Ul Copt," Doria said slowly. "He claimed to be nineteen, which is a bit old for a novice, but we had the space, so I accepted him anyway. He's literate, and tested out of the introductory magic and cosmology classes. He's been attending the ones on ritual practice and the history of the Order faithfully. Not a bad student, and generally polite, but not very friendly. I _thought_ he was spending his extra off-time in the library, but now that I think about it, I've never actually seen him there." 

"The other novice who brought him in said he'd been putting in double shifts—sometimes triple—on preparing the new garden, doing the stone and timber hauling for the construction of the raised beds, carrying several times the load a normal human could. Up to twenty hours a day of sustained heavy labour. Our diet here can't support that, and when you add in the drain the self-harm must be putting on him, it isn't surprising that he collapsed." The healer shook his head. 

"And his prognosis?" the high priest asked, stroking his salt-and-pepper beard. 

"The fever should go down in a day or two, and I expect him to be back on his feet not long after that. But if we don't figure out some way of dealing with whatever's going on in his head, it's just going to happen again." 

The three priests exchanged glances. None of them seemed particularly optimistic. 

* * *

The high priest carefully squared away the papers he'd been working on when he heard the knock on the door. "Come in." 

The young man who stepped into the office wore a novice's brown robe. His aqua hair hung down his back in a long tail tied at the nape of his neck with a bit of leather thong, and there were slight hollows under his cheekbones. His golden eyes burned like those of a wild animal, but he bowed politely enough. 

"You wanted to see me, sir?" 

"Yes, I did. Please sit down, young Val." He gestured at the only chair not covered in books and papers, a high-backed, uncomfortable wooden thing suitable for impressing on errant novices that they were in a great deal of trouble. Whether or not that was the best approach in this case was open to question, but clearing one of the other chairs might easily have been worse, because it would have meant admitting that there was something abnormal about this conversation. 

Val perched on the edge of this seat, his body tense. It was as though he thought he would need to flee or fight, the high priest thought sadly. 

"Val Ul Copt," the high priest said. "How old are you really?" 

"Is that what this is about?" the dragon asked, still tense. "I was hatched one thousand and fifteen years after the end of the Kouma War, so I really am nineteen." 

Hmm. This one was going to be a tough nut to crack. "Why seek to join a human religious order? I know that dragons have their own institutions." 

"Because I don't qualify." 

"Why not?" At the sound of splintering wood, the high priest added, "I remind you that disobeying the lawful directive of a superior is grounds for expulsion from our order." 

Val closed his eyes and took a slow breath. "Dragon clerical orders are species-specific, and I'm the last of my species." 

That was not the answer the high priest had been expecting. "Black dragons are the most common of the greater dragon species." 

"I'm not a black." Val darted a quick look at the high priest's face, then grimaced and capitulated. "Ceiphied created five species of greater dragon in His image: black, white, golden, dimos, and ancient. The ancients never had a very large population, and they died out at the end of the Kouma War . . . except for one egg held in a stasis spell." 

"You," the high priest filled in. 

"Me. And just to add to the fun, my ancestors apparently offended a lot of people. Not only am I not welcome among other dragons, I'm not _safe_ there, because there are still some Elders who would be quite happy to take all of my species' supposed sins out on my hide. Never mind that I've never even _met_ another ancient dragon." 

"It's only to be expected that that would trouble you," the high priest said, and the dragon's expression darkened. 

"You found the scars . . . well, of course you did. I _thought_ everyone in the infirmary was looking at me funny." 

"We only wish to understand why you would so damage the body that Ceiphied has given you. Do you hate yourself so much?" _Whenever I've seen this, it's usually been pain as distraction,_ one of the more senior healers had told the high priest. _The pain from the self-inflicted injuries temporarily masks some deeper, unendurable agony, and gives the sufferer the illusion of control._

A shiver ran through Val's body. "It's better than flying apart." 

"Please—I don't entirely understand. We cant help you if you don't—" 

"Alright," Val interrupted, his voice almost a snarl. "Fine, then. I'll explain, and you'll throw me out, but at least then you'll shut up and go _away_." 

The high priest forced himself not to react. Having spent years running a seminary, he'd seen a fair selection of youthful foolishness. It certainly wasn't the first time he'd faced down an angry or sullen young man, and he knew that losing his temper would only confirm any fears Val might have about his acceptance here. 

"The aloneness hurts," the young dragon said. "I've never really belonged anywhere. But if it was just that, I don't think I'd have to claw my arms to ribbons to keep from losing my mind." The sound he made might have been intended as a laugh. "Good thing I learned how to cast Recovery when I was still a hatchling, or I'd probably be crippled by now." 

_You're stalling,_ the high priest thought, but said nothing, keeping his expression neutral and his eyes on the young dragon's face. 

"The truth is that I don't understand either," Val said. "For as long as I can remember, I've felt intense guilt about . . . something. I don't know what, or why. Sometimes I wake up screaming from nightmares that I can't remember. Guilt and anger and hate and I don't have anything to go with that, not a glimpse of an image or a sound or even a _smell_ to work with that would let me start tracing the reasons. My foster mother hauled me to no less than eight mind-healers, and they weren't able to figure it out either. Most of them advised her to keep me tranquilized." A snort told the high priest what the young dragon thought of _that_. "Exhausting myself helps. If I sleep deeply enough, I don't dream. I . . . haven't had to use my talons nearly as much since coming here. At home, it was . . . They wouldn't _let_ me work myself until I was really tired." 

"Being a hard worker is a good thing, in general," the high priest said. "Working yourself to the point of becoming ill, however, is not." 

"I know that. I'll be more careful." 

"A seminary isn't normally a place one goes to find a job involving heavy labour." 

"I know that, too." The young dragon was suddenly looking at the floor. 

"Then why . . . ?" the high priest prompted. 

"You don't believe I have a vocation?" Val asked, with a twisted smile. 

"I think it would have to be an extraordinarily intense one to prevail over your circumstances . . . unless you have an additional reason for being here." 

A scowl crossed the young dragon's face. "That's personal, and you're throwing me out anyway, so why in hell should I tell you?" 

"I haven't said I'm throwing you out. Indeed, I'm starting to think that might be the most foolish thing I could do. If our order can give you something that you need, cutting you off from it would chafe at my conscience. But I do need to understand what is going on." 

Val's hands flexed where they rested on his knees. He appeared to be having an internal debate with himself about something. Then, "What do you know about holy magic?" 

The high priest blinked. "It's the collective name for spells that call on the surviving Dragon Gods, just as black magic calls on the Mazoku." 

"And any trained sorcerer should be able to cast it. But I can't. Even the spells that are taught to ordinary dragons as hatchlings, so that they'll be able to fight the Mazoku if there's ever another war. My foster mother was a minor priestess of Vrabazard, back in the days before I was hatched, and she says she's never heard of a case like mine before. Neither have the other dragons she's consulted." 

The high priest was once again at a loss for words. 

"It's clear that there's something wrong with me," Val continued. "I don't know what a hatchling not even able to feed himself could possibly have done to offend the Dragon Gods so badly, so I have to assume it's some kind of symbolic vengeance against my species. I was hoping that I could find some way to ask. To find out what we'd done wrong, to learn what I had to expiate . . . This seemed like a good place to start." 

The high priest firmly quashed his desire to comfort the novice. The young dragon's stiff body language spoke of the same foolish male pride as a young human might have displayed in the same situation, and a wrong move might cause him to lash out. 

"The gods speak to us when they choose, and often not about what we are interested in hearing," the older man said at last, before the silence could grow too long. "And they seldom address even the most devout and pious priest. Meditation can make their voices clearer, however. I'll see to it that you're taught the specific disciplines that we use. Beyond that, I can only tell you to pray. The reason for the gods' attitude toward you will become clear in time. In the meanwhile . . . there is nothing that makes you unsuitable as a novice of our order, but I think you might do better as an apprentice to a lone priest at one of our minor temples, rather than here at the seminary. I have in mind to send you to Dallangys Island. There should be plenty of hard labour available there, on the boats or at the docks, if you feel the need. Also, the priest there is getting old, and although his mind is still sharp, he could use some assistance with . . . purely physical tasks. He was my mentor, once," the high priest finished, and watched for a reaction. 

"Dallangys Island," Val repeated slowly. His hands clenched one last time, then relaxed. "Very well. I accept your judgement."


	2. Chapter 1

"Thanks for the help!" the supervising longshoreman called after me and waved. 

I waved back to him, despite the burning in my muscles. In the three years I'd been here, I'd never seen marble columns get shipped through Copper Cove before, but I was actually kind of grateful to the merchant who had done it. Carrying big chunks of stone around was a workout even for me. The human workers had had to pair up to carry each cylinder off the ship, and I'd just taken one under each arm, but I didn't ask to be paid any more than the humans. Which made everyone happy. 

Normally I jogged up the steep street, punctuated with flights of stone steps, that led up from the harbour. Today I just walked, exchanging greetings with the people I'd met during the years I'd been here—here a fishmonger, there a couple of children who attended the temple school, and old Sam the netmaker, who had displayed his wares along the same bit of street's edge for more than fifty years, or so everyone told me. 

The temple was near the top of the hill, not far below the governor's mansion, and given the summer sun I was sweating heavily by the time I got there. Not for the first time, I considered cutting my hair off, and not for the first time, I decided against it. 

I ignored the stone steps of the entrance and instead slipped through a narrow side gate and around to the back of the building, where I used the water pump and bucket to sluice off the dirt and sweat and generally cool down. Then I toweled myself dry with a piece of sacking and put the cassock I'd discarded after the morning service back on. There. Good enough to satisfy the handful of fishermen who would come up for the evening homily before taking their boats out, and Father Teremar wasn't picky. As he liked to put it, the gods saw us at both our best and our worst, and our appearances mattered less to them than what was in our hearts. Making an effort to clean up to show respect was good, but it didn't matter if the effort was imperfect. 

Not that the gods seemed to care what was in _my_ heart, I reflected sourly, and not for the first time, as I let myself into the temple through the back door. Three years on this island, and nothing had changed. I still woke screaming in the night, although less often than I had as a child, and I still felt the nauseating churn of guilt inside me, like a black whirlpool sucking me down. And there were fresh, reddened scars on the insides of my wrists. When I changed to my true form, the scales in those areas were buckled, discoloured, and misshapen, destroyed so many times that they'd forgotten how to regrow. I'd taken to bandaging both wrists to hide the marks, wrapping them in strips of cloth, an affectation Father Teremar let me get away with. 

Really, the old man was the most patient person I'd ever met. He'd let me stay on even though we both knew I wasn't cut out to be a priest, claiming that even just having an extra white sorcerer here at the temple, especially one powerful enough to cast Resurrection, was more help than he deserved. I'd saved more than a few people since coming here, people with broken backs or crushed skulls or who had swallowed far more water than was safe. And that was just with my magic. I'd also rescued stranded fishermen, flying out to awkwardly positioned rocks and boat-ripping reefs to carry them back, and even acted as a substitute lighthouse on one occasion. Dozens of people saved. Maybe a couple of hundred, given the size of one of the ships that had entered the harbour the night of the substitute-lighthouse incident. 

I couldn't help wondering when it would be enough. When I would have saved enough people to make up for whatever sin my ancestors had committed. I knew it was wrong to think that way, and that wasn't the main reason I'd saved those people, but I still had the endless crushing feeling of not being good enough. 

Father Teremar was waiting for me in the sanctuary, in front of the statue to my namesake, Valwin, that supported the left side of the altar. The statue on the right depicted Ragradia. Wind and water were particularly important here, on an island that relied on the ocean for both food and commerce. That didn't mean that Vrabazard and Rangort and Flarelord Ceiphied were forgotten, of course. The massive fresco behind the altar showed all the gods, and there were five individual shrines along the north wall. The ones to Ragradia and Valwin were a bit larger, though. 

"Another good day down at the harbour?" the old priest inquired as I went to join him. 

"Good enough," I said, with a shrug. "Two merchant ships came in practically back to back, and they were scrambling to get the cargo from the first one to the warehouse and from the second one to the first, so they gave me a five-silver bonus. It should all be credited to the Widows' and Orphans' Fund by tomorrow morning." 

"Excellent. Light the candles for me, would you?" 

I was already reaching for the taper, to carry a flame over from the ever-burning lamp in the wall shrine to Vrabazard. Father Teremar' hands had acquired a chronic tremble, and although most of the time it wasn't serious, he preferred not to carry lit candles. 

The oil level in the lamp reservoir was getting low, I noted. I'd have to refill it tonight before I went to bed. For now, though, I carried the taper up to the altar and lit the two larger candles on either side, then blew the taper out and stored it on a hidden shelf not visible from the pews. 

"Thank you, Val. You're a good lad." 

I snorted, but I also felt the corner of my mouth turn up. 

During the service, I knelt to the left of the altar, in the shadow of a drapery, on a cushion just thick enough to pad my knees a bit without letting me forget that there was stone underneath. As always, I tried to pray, addressing the Dragon Gods with all humility and trying to listen to the stillness inside for their answers. 

As usual, my words fell away into silence, and I got nothing back. I bit my lip hard enough to draw blood even with my hopeless round little human teeth. The alternative was a scream of frustration that might have lifted the roof off. Never any answers. 

Sometimes I thought the thing that pissed me off the most was the idea that I might never find those answers at all, that I'd live out my life and die at a ripe old age without ever understanding why the Dragon Gods hated me. Letting myself think about that for too long sometimes ended with me beating against a rock with my fists. Some of the rocks hadn't survived that, either. 

I was starting to think that I should have tried to find the underground cult of Deep-Sea Dolphin that was supposed to exist somewhere on the island. But I'd promised Filia-mama that I'd never go to the Mazoku for aid. And having met Xellos, I suspected their help wouldn't be too reliable even if I managed to find them. 

The prayers and the hymns seemed to drag on forever, but I knew that if I'd timed them with a sandglass, it would have been less than half an hour before Father Teremar lifted his hand for the final blessing. By then, some of the fishermen down in the pews were looking as impatient as I felt, wanting to get back out on the water while the thick shoals of ogre herring on their way to spawn were still passing near the island, but none of them were willing to leave without a blessing. That would have been bad luck, and having worked the boats a time or two, I knew just how seriously these men and women took their luck. 

It ended at last, and I rose to my feet while the congregation filed out. I snuffed the candles on the altar, leaving the sunset light falling through the stained-glass windows as the only illumination in the sanctuary other than the ever-burning lamp. There might have been additional offering candles at Vrabazard's shrine, but no one had stopped there to pray in almost a week. Even Rangort did better, with a generous number of pebbles on the indented surface of the altar. Dallangys Island did have a few farmers, although it had never been a major industry here. Valwin's shrine was covered with pinwheels, though, and we'd had to put hooks on the outside of Ragradia's to hang the extra strings of seashells. 

" _Lighting_ ," Father Teremar murmured, and a softly glowing ball of radiance appeared in his hand. His magic skills hadn't diminished with age, although his bucket capacity limited him to the Recovery-Flow Break-Dicleary level. "I put the leftover stew from last night over the coals to warm. It should be ready about now." 

"Thank you," I said. 

The elderly priest laughed. "No, thank _you_ , lad. Since you got here, I've eaten more meat every month than I had in the ten years before I met you, and it's your work that's paying for it." More seriously, he added, "I saw your expression tonight. Don't lose hope. Sooner or later, everything will make sense." 

_I doubt it._ But I couldn't bring myself to say those words to the old man's face. 

We didn't talk much as we sat at the kitchen table and ate the thick, meaty stew and barley bread. We never did. Well, maybe at the beginning, when I'd still been learning about life on the island and had questions to ask. And I wasn't so tired in the evenings. These days, though, we just said the usual stuff about the weather and our work, with neither of us interested in more. 

After setting the stewpot aside to soak off the crusts of reheated gravy—I'd clean it properly in the morning, before I went down to the harbour—and went to my room at the back of the building. My bed wasn't that great, a thin straw mattress laid over cinderblock, but it was better than sleeping on the floor. I stripped off the damned cassock before laying down with my head pillowed on my arm. Tired as I was, I drifted off almost immediately. 

_Clang!_

I sat bolt upright, woken, not by my nightmares for a change, but by noise from outside. _Damnit, why are they ringing the hurricane bell on a clear night?_ I could see the stars through the narrow window above my bed, and feel the night breeze eddying against my skin. 

Then I smelled smoke, and remembered, belatedly, that the bell was technically for any emergency, not just hurricanes. Fire, this time, it seemed. I pushed myself upright and stuffed my feet into my shoes. A few Aqua Creates ought to deal with the main problem, and afterwards I'd have to tend the burns . . . 

Then I got outside, and realized it wasn't going to be that easy. At all. 

Half the town was on fire, with flames and smoke gouting out of windows, up chimneys, and through holes in collapsed roofs. But there were several people lying in the street who hadn't died from the fire. Long slashes cross-crossed their bodies. I thought at first that they'd been cut down with swords, but then I noticed that the slash marks were always in parallel groups of four. As though they'd been made by claws. 

I cursed softly. The streets were too narrow for me to revert to dragon form without destroying buildings, but I transformed my arms and let my wings out, then leaped for the roof of the nearest not-burning house. I needed to figure out what the hell was going on, and whether there was anyone but me . . . still alive. I launched myself from the chimney and let the rising heat from the fires lift me high into the air. 

About ten seconds later, I figured out that had been a really bad idea when a barrage of Flare and Freeze Arrows nearly shredded my wings. I dove back down quickly, aiming for the edge of the town square, which might just be big enough to hold a dragon. 

I wasn't sure how much good that was going to do, though. During the split second I'd had to look out over Copper Cove, I'd figured out some of what was going on, and it really wasn't good. 

Brass demons. Lots and lots and _lots_ of brass demons, probably a couple of hundred. Spread out all over town. Killing people. 

How the hell was I supposed to fight that? 

I should mention that while they're not full Mazoku, brass demons are nasty customers. Their bodies are well-armoured, immune to most types of physical attacks except the blunt organ-crushing variety, and they're resistant to heat, cold, and electricity. Astral attack spells do work against them, but the problem is that attack spells in astral shamanism tend to focus on a single target. White magic is useless, since its few offensive spells affect undead, not demons. 

Holy magic could have cleared them all out in seconds. I knew half a dozen applicable spells. 

I just couldn't cast any of them. 

I landed on top of one of the brass demons, crushing its ribcage with my weight and momentum, and then kicking its skull in to make sure it stayed down. I punched another one in the face, smashing it in and getting brains and blood all over my hand. Stench of blood and smoke and leaking bowel matter, and people screaming . . . I could feel something inside me tremble right on the edge of breaking, and took it out on another brass demon that chose that moment to emerge from an alley. 

_Not this! Not this not-this notthis notthisnotthis—_ blood and the screams of the dying and a tearing sensation inside— 

A woman swore, rolling down the stairs from an upper terrace and into the square with her dress smouldering. It was Duvessa, who came to the temple every day to pray for her merchant husband's good fortune and safe return. Her presence distracted me from the chaos inside my head, steadying my trembling nerves. 

"East eight warehouse!" I yelled at her. "It's solid stone with a slate roof, and the only thing inside's a shipment of copper ingots! It won't burn! Tell everyone!" I figured that if we got all the people in the same place, all the brass demons might gather there too, and then I might have a chance of beating them to death. 

Duvessa nodded grimly, staggering to her feet. Her skirt was far too short, and I could see the burns on her calves, but she lurched into a run, headed for an alley that ran parallel to the main street, down towards the harbour. 

A brass demon jumped off a roof at her. I intercepted it in midair, and hit the ground hard with it on top of me. It wrapped its hands around my neck, and I willed scales into existence there before it could claw my jugular open, but that wouldn't keep me from being strangled. I brought my taloned hands up and pressed hard against both sides of its head as I choked. It yanked upward, trying to save its skull, but I dug my talons in and shoved both thumbs in its eyes. That made it let go of me and rear back, and I brought up a knee to splinter its ribs, then crushed its head like I'd done to the first one. Duvessa was well away, and turning into a dragon wouldn't really be to my advantage here. I needed to think on a human scale. So coming to the square had just wasted precious time. I snarled at nothing and headed for a side street. 

There was a corpse there, shoved over into the gutter. One of the brats from the temple school, who had pranked Father Teremar last week by coating the chalk in grease. 

He'd never do anything like that again, not with his guts lying in a tangle beside him. 

" _Fuck,_ " I whispered. I'd been intending to lead as many Brass Demons from the immediate area into the square as possible, then hit them with a Vlave Howl, on the theory that the lava would be hot enough to overcome their resistance, but instead I found myself frozen to the spot, shaking with rage and guilt. There was no way I could kill enough of them fast enough to save everyone, or even just everyone who was still alive. And all because . . . because . . . 

_For their sake, damn it!_ I fired off into the dark. _I don't matter, but you have to save them!_ "Anak. Salm." And the amplifying hand gesture, twisting the wrist just so. "Natak." No sense of power. Keep going anyway, and hope that this time . . . that this one time . . . "Sakum. _Chaotic Disintegrate!_ " 

Nothing. The Power Words might as well have been a grocery list. 

A tortured howl tore its way from my throat. Worthless! Eternally fucking worthless! Why was I even still alive? Why . . . ? 

" _Damn you!_ " I pushed the words out with all the force in me, screaming them both into the sky and the inner dark. " _Damn you fuckers straight to the Sea of Chaos! Doesn't even_ ONE _of you have the balls to help?! I'm going to kill every single fucking one of you and send the entire world straight to hell!_ " 

And then the entire world seemed to stop dead as I heard the distant murmur of a voice inside my head. 

«Mmh . . . Val?» Male voice, thick with sleep at first, but gradually throwing it off. «What's wrong, little dragon?» Hot, red pulse against my mind . . . 

"What's _wrong?!_ " I snarled into thin air. "I'm knee-deep in fucking brass demons and they're trashing the town and I can't do a fucking thing about it without destroying what I'm trying to save!" 

«Here, let me.» Prickly heat in my brain, my eyes and ears . . . but it was oddly comforting. Like a wool blanket. «Fuck, that's a mess . . . but it doesn't look like they're guarded on the astral at all, so it'll be easier to attack them from there. It'll knock all the humans out, so the town might still burn down, but it's the best I can do for you right now.» 

"Tell me what I need to do." What the hell was I talking to, anyway? Not Vrabazard, I didn't think. Maybe some kind of fire spirit? 

«Just relax and let it come.» 

"Relax, right." I snorted, but I also did my best. Other words came to me, and I let them tumble from my mouth without trying to stop them. "Dark dragon, eternal flame of red, lend me your might that all who stand against me may perish! _Chaos Inferno!_ " 

Power blasted through me, and I bit all the way through my lower lip trying not to scream. When a sorcerer casts normal spells, he uses his own power to control and channel the energy coming from whatever being he's invoked as a power source, but this felt like my power pool had suddenly been swamped by a tidal wave of red fire that was now spreading out from me in an immense rippling rush. My awareness seemed stretched to the limit as I sensed one being after another flicker out, scorched to ash by the tidal wave of red, while others were pushed away by the shock. 

I fell to my knees, and then flat out on my stomach, as my talons dug into the palms of my hands. 

The last thing I heard before losing consciousness was the rumble of a deep voice that I was pretty sure was only audible to me. 

«Serves you fuckers right for tangling with my Priest.»


	3. Chapter 2

I sat bolt upright, shaking off at least two sets of restraining hands, before I realized that I had a bedroll under me and wasn't anywhere near where I'd fallen unconscious. That, and there weren't any brass demons within at least ten miles . . . how did I know that? 

Oh, right. Because they were all dead. 

Jerking my head from side to side to get a look around, I decided I was in a warehouse down by the docks. The air smelled of metal, ash, and the ocean, and the people trying to hold me down had been two of the longshoremen I often worked with. And sitting on a crate nearby was Father Teremar. 

"What happened?" I asked. 

"We were hoping you could tell us," the elderly priest replied. "One moment, there were brass demons all over the place. A few seconds later, a massive wave passed through the astral and they all combusted spontaneously while most of the people lost consciousness. I wasn't out for very long, and when I came to, I immediately cast the wake-up spell over the largest area I could manage. A large portion of the town burned, what with brass demons running around while on fire and transferring the flames to every bit of wood and fabric they could reach, but the wind was coming off the water, so the fire ran away up the hill, and the docks and the waterfront are largely unscathed. In the morning, when things started to cool down, we found you near the middle of the square. It's surprising you weren't burned to a crisp, and I can't help think that your survival wasn't entirely natural." 

"It might not have been," I admitted. "What about . . . the people?" 

"We've found just shy of a hundred and thirty bodies so far," Father Teremar admitted with just the slightest tremour in his voice. "There are more than two hundred still missing, and we may never find some of them if they were caught in the fires. We may also lose more of the seriously wounded. Still, it could have been much worse. If the brass demons hadn't vanished when they did, I think we might have lost _everyone_." 

His sharp gaze raked over me, and I bit my tongue. Tell him? Don't tell him? 

"I failed to cast a holy spell again," I admitted. "I started cursing—I was half-crazed, I don't even remember what I said—and something . . . answered me. Inside. I don't think it was one of the Dragon Gods, though. Maybe a spirit. It cast the spell that destroyed the brass demons _through_ me. And I think it might have protected me from the fire as well." 

"Hmm." Father Teremar frowned for a moment. "Can you tell me anything else about this . . . entity? What it said? I assume it did speak." 

"I think I woke it up somehow. It seemed sleepy at first. And it . . ." I ran the words through my head a second time, then a third, but the conclusion was inescapable. "I think it— _he_ , I had the strong impression of a male persona—knew me. Somehow. Practically the first thing he did was call me by name. And the touch of his power wasn't uncomfortable, at least at first." 

My stomach chose that moment to grumble, which saved me from having to talk any more. I wanted to think a little more about what had happened before I decided whether or not to discuss the wording of the spell the strange being had had me cast, or what he'd said just before I'd lost consciousness. 

"I'm starving," I said instead. "Is there anything around here to eat? For that matter, how long was I out?" 

"Two days," one of the longshoremen said. "We'll get you something, but I hope you like fish, 'cause that's what we're mostly gonna be eating for a while. Main granary burned, and so did the inland market. We've got boatloads of herring, though." 

Well, that was something, anyway. 

A platter of pan-fried herring and a mug of tea were soon placed beside me. I counted the fish, blinked, and re-counted them. I got six both times. 

"I can't eat all of this," I protested. 

"Try," Father Teremar said firmly. "You need to replenish the energy you lost in that casting—were you even aware that your hair is white at the temples?—and like the man said, we have plenty of fish. Plus, we need you on your feet again. There are injured here that need your power." 

I grimaced. Yeah, the healing machine, that was me. I broke off a chunk of fish and stuck it in my mouth, since no one had bothered to provide any utensils. It wasn't until it hit my stomach that I discovered how genuinely hungry I was. 

A soft chuckle raced along my nerves as I began to stuff my face. «Guess your appetite hasn't suffered from whatever shit you've been getting into lately,» said a bass voice. My head whipped around, but there was no one here except the elderly priest and the two longshoremen, and I knew that hadn't been either of them. 

"Val? Is something wrong?" Father Teremar asked. 

"Thought I heard something, that's all." Or at least, I hoped it had just been a hallucination. The alternative was having that damned spirit, who didn't sound sleepy now at all, offering a running commentary on my life. I could think of some worse fates, but not many. 

It's difficult to eat a well-cooked fish with your hands—it comes apart in little crumbles. I ended up chasing bits of meat all over the platter. I did feel much better once my stomach was full, though. 

"I need to take a leak," I said, pushing the blankets still covering my legs out of my way. Father Teremar frowned at what he saw as coarse language. I'd never had the heart to tell him that "I need to take a piss" was standard on the docks. "Once I'm done with that, I'll fire off as many Resurrection spells as I can manage. It might not be more than three or four, so pick out the worst patients, okay? Where are we, anyway?" 

"Upstairs in West Three," said one of the longshoremen. 

"Thanks." West Three was one of the warehouses that had offices above it. The nearest . . . public convenience . . . was in an alcove in the side of West Two. 

I felt a little dizzy as I stood up, but I forced myself not to show it. It wore off almost right away, anyway. 

Outside, it was a sunny day, with a fresh breeze off the ocean and a bit of scudding cloud high up—the wispy kind that was so high above the ground that you got short of breath if you tried to reach it by flying. In this area, where I couldn't see up the hill, the town looked almost unscathed, and people were going about their normal business, with fishing boats coming in and going out, and cargo being loaded aboard a merchant ship. 

I made it to the alcove at West Two and opened my pants. "If you're still watching me, and you peek, I'm going to twist your balls off," I muttered to the spirit, or whatever he was. 

«Why? Do you really think it's something I haven't seen before? I know every inch of you, little dragon.» 

"Son of a bitch," I growled. Well, fine, let him get an eyeful, because if I had to hold it in much longer, I was going to burst. 

I waited until I'd emptied my bladder and packed myself back up before saying anything else. "How long are you going to _keep_ watching me?" 

«Give me a break—it isn't like I'm doing it on purpose. I tried to sever the link between us just before I died the last time, but you can tell just how fucking well that worked.» 

"If you're dead, then how are you talking to me?" It seemed like a reasonable question to ask. Hopefully, the answer would make more sense than the rest of this. 

«I _was_ dead. For a while, anyway. Given all the shit that went down at the time, I'm surprised you were able to wake me up. I sure as hell didn't expect to ever come back again.» 

My thoughts were all tangled together. I couldn't even figure out what to ask to make sense of this. 

«Pretty big mistake for Phibby to make, really,» the voice in my head continued thoughtfully. «Little shit that he was. I never knew him to be careless before. Crazy, maybe, but . . .» 

"Would you shut up for a bit?" I snapped. "I need to think." 

_Dark dragon, eternal flame of red._ Spells that called on specific powers were supposed to describe them at the beginning of the invocation, and I didn't like my eavesdropper's description one bit. The only other being I knew who was described as both "red" and "dark" was Ruby-Eyed Shabranigdo, the great evil himself, but it would be a real stretch to call Ruby-Eye a dragon. And no one would ever describe Vrabazard as "dark". 

I could have asked the voice who he was. I could have. Of course, he had no real reason to tell the truth . . . and even without that, my mind cringed away from the idea. Like some part of me really didn't want to know. 

Well. Provided I could handle a foul-mouthed voice in my head without losing my mind, I had more urgent things to deal with than my confusion. I turned back toward West Three. 

Father Teremar met me just inside the warehouse. "The wounded are mostly in West Four," he said. "And the governor is probably going to beg you to heal his son. Ignore him." 

"I would have anyway." Governor Sevastin had two sons, or had had before the brass demons showed up, but they were both pieces of work: one a gambling addict, the other given to drugging young women's drinks if they wouldn't spread their legs for him voluntarily. I wasn't about to heal either of them while there was anyone else who needed my help. Including the one-legged beggar who had a regular place in the temple square. Old One-Pin might be of no particular use to anybody, but at least he was harmless. 

West Four had been mostly empty at the time of the fires, and the few bales of goods it had contained had consisted mostly of woolen blankets, woven on the mechanical water-looms of the south and now waiting for a ship north. They were eventually consigned for Zephilia or somewhere. One bale had been broken open now, for use in the makeshift hospital. 

It was . . . bad. I knew that the moment I walked in the door and the smell hit me: cooked flesh, burnt flesh, rot, fecal matter. No one was screaming, but I suspected that was because the worst injured were hoarse by now. The moans and croaks were bad enough. There were no proper beds, of course, just blankets on the floor. Some people walked from patient to patient, offering water and pain potions and encouragement. Others sat or knelt beside a friend or loved one, talking or helping them eat or drink, or just holding their hand. 

"Where do I start?" I asked the priest, who was right behind me. 

"Over here." He led me to one side, where three people had been laid out a bit apart from the others. All were women, all were badly injured. Two were heavily pregnant. The third cradled an infant in her unburned arm so that it could nurse at her undamaged breast. Two lives for the price of one in every case. 

Before I could do anything, though, someone cleared his throat right behind me. "Ah- _hem_! Excuse me!" 

"You don't sound like you really want to be excused," I drawled as I turned around. Father Teremar snorted. Governor Sevastin, who had addressed me, gave me a nasty look that he didn't cover up quite quickly enough with his politician face. "What _do_ you want?" 

"Please, I want you to heal my son! He's right over there—" 

"No," I said flatly. 

Sevastin glared at me. "How dare you?!" His face was turning a bit red. 

Unfortunately, I couldn't seem to figure out how to say "your sons are both miserable wastes of space" without starting a fight right there and then. "Your son is going to have to wait his turn. I'm not giving priority to my friends either, even though I'm sure there must be some people I know who were injured in this. These women were moved to the head of the line to avoid having them lose their children." _So in short, if I waste my time and power on your son, I might end up murdering a baby. Take that, you prune-faced bastard._

"If you won't come on your own, I'll make you do it!" 

The knife he pulled out was laughable: a tiny jeweled stiletto. And he had no idea how to hold it. Did he really think I was going to bend down and let him slit my throat? 

Inside my head, where only I could hear him, the spirit was laughing his ass off. I ignored him, and let my right hand scale over—I preferred not to be cut, just in case Sevastin had had the brains to poison the tiny weapon. I couldn't think of any other way it might be effective. I slapped it out of his hand with enough force to break his wrist, and the knife bounced across the floor and embedded itself in a rolled blanket. 

Sevastin screamed and grabbed his wrist with the other hand. 

«He's going to find a way to make your life miserable over this,» the voice in my head commented. «Unless that's what you want, you're going to have to find some way to salve his fucking pride. On his own, he's a pissant little asshole, but once things start to get organized again, he'll have people backing him up.» 

Crap. "Can you do something about his wrist?" I asked Father Teremar, gesturing at Sevastin. The old priest would know how to talk the man down, and a cleanly broken bone was within the scope of a Recovery spell. The spell itself should make Sevastin tired, since it would draw from his own physical reserves to knit the bone. Taken together, it should keep him out of my hair for at least a little while. 

I might have to leave the island before it was completely back on its feet. The notion made me feel odd. I forced myself to set it aside to think about later. 

"Of course," Father Teremar said, and turned to the governor. "This way please, sir." 

As he lead Sevastin away, I turned to the three women who had been waiting patiently on their makeshift beds. "Sorry about that." 

The one with the baby offered me a lopsided smile. "It's fine. At least he didn't start yelling about the inferiority of commoners." 

"He doesn't quite dare do that to my face—probably scared of pissing me off," I said, crouching down beside her. She gestured to the woman to her left. 

"Heal Lily first. She's got a broken back as well as the burns, and I'm only half-roasted." 

Three Resurrection spells cast one after the other made me feel a bit dizzy. A fourth, cast on a small child who had been badly burned across the face, left me weak in the knees and forced me to sit down. 

"You'd be more useful if you could replenish my power pool instead of just giving me advice on politics," I muttered to the voice as I adjusted my position on the edge of a crate. 

«I could, but it wouldn't be much fun for you. Sort of like swallowing a live coal.» 

"Useless bastard." I spoke a bit too loudly that time, and a middle-aged man with all four limbs wrapped in bandages gave me an odd look. "The governor," I told him, and he snorted and looked away again. 

«My power's better at some things than at others. Healing and restoring happens to be the thing I suck most at. If you've got another five hundred brass demons, though, I can wipe the floor with them without breaking a sweat.» 

"Five _hun_ —" I bit down on my tongue before my voice could get too loud again. That left me with a mouthful of blood where my fangs had cut in. I swallowed it, pretending that nothing was wrong. "Were there really that many?" 

«Four hundred ninety-three. And I'm still not sure what they were doing there. Which I don't like one bit. There's no way that a human could summon and hold so many, but what the fuck would one of the greater Mazoku want with such a shitty little island? Then again, I've been out of the game so long that I've lost track of what everyone's up to. I just hope another bit of Ruby-Eye hasn't surfaced. There'll be hell to pay if that happens.» 

Not a Mazoku, then, since Ruby-Eye's revival had to be one of the things they wanted the most. I hadn't realized how worried I'd been about that until I felt myself relax. 

"Is there some way you can find out?" I asked the voice. 

«I don't know. I've been out of circulation for more than twenty years, and my old contacts have dispersed. I guess it's time for me to dig a few of them up and scare the shit out of them.» He didn't sound at all displeased at the prospect. «Don't worry, little dragon. I'll look after you.» 

"Fuck off," I whispered harshly, and heard his laughter. 

I managed two more Resurrection spells that afternoon, but I was so tired afterwards that I flopped down on the bedroll of one of my ex-patients and fell asleep almost instantly, even though the blankets stank of the gunk they'd been using on burns. 

When I woke up again, the converted warehouse was dark except for a single lamp burning near the door. I rose from the blankets and tiptoed toward it, trying not to trip over anyone. Judging from the fact that I heard few moans and a fair number of snores, most of the wounded must have been asleep. 

The light turned out to be a familiar etheric lamp, the ornamental brasswork somewhat blackened with soot. The fire had reached the temple, then, and my meager belongings must have gone up in smoke. Well, I hadn't had much, anyway. Just a couple of changes of clothes and some letters from home. In any case, there was a platter of fish and a pitcher of water surrounded by cups beside the lamp. Father Teremar was dozing in a chair by the door. His eyes blinked open as I poured myself a glass of water. 

"Sorry," I whispered. "Didn't mean to wake you up." 

"No need to be so careful, lad," the old priest said in a conversational tone. "I cast Sleeping on everyone here except you and me. Otherwise most of them would get very little rest. Have something to eat." 

I was already reaching for the fish. "We haven't lost anyone else, have we?" 

"No, although it was a near thing at one point. Partly my fault—I haven't been keeping careful enough track of who I've been casting Recovery on, and I almost exhausted one man's strength." Father Teremar grimaced. Even by the lamplight, I could see that his eyes were sunken, and his thinning hair had gone from grey to true ice white. 

"When's the last time you ate?" I asked. 

"A couple of hours ago. Don't worry, I haven't been stinting myself . . . although I'm already getting tired of fish. I'm getting old, though, and I'm not enough of a sorcerer to hold my own aging in abeyance, so I recover more slowly from everything than I did when I was younger. Including spell exhaustion." He looked away from me, gazing into the lamp. "Our lives must seem very brief to a dragon." 

"You forget that I'm a very young dragon." 

Father Teremar smiled. "Yes, I do forget that. My memory must be going, along with everything else." 

I snorted. "Don't give me that. You're one of the sharpest people I've ever known." 

There was a bit of a pause while I shoveled food into my mouth. Then, "You have something to ask me, don't you," the priest said. "Come on, lad, spit it out." 

I swallowed my fish, having no intention of spitting _that_ out. "If you found a fragmentary parchment somewhere with a spell written on it," I said slowly, choosing my words with care, "and you didn't know anything about the spell itself, but the Power Words began with 'Dark dragon, eternal flame of red,' who or what would you assume it was invoking?" 

"Chaos Dragon Gaav," came the prompt reply, and if I'd had anything in my mouth, I _would_ have spit it out. With force. "Of course, he's dead." 

"And if the spell worked well enough to fry five hundred brass demons?" 

Father Teremar froze for a moment. "I . . . don't know, lad. I honestly don't know. Either there would have to be some spirit of fire who can be described in terms very similar to Gaav, or Lina Inverse didn't succeed in killing him after all." 

"Hellmaster Phibrizzo was the one who killed the Chaos Dragon. I have that from two different people who were present that day." Of course, Xellos wasn't exactly trustworthy, but I'd also had the story from Filia's old friend Zelgadis Greywords, who had passed through our town a couple of times when I was a hatchling. "Lina Inverse did kill Phibrizzo. Sort of." Regurgitating those facts meant that I didn't have to think about the other, didn't have to spend quite as much energy tamping down the storm that was building inside me. 

Gaav. It just made too much sense. What kind of dragon wouldn't be able to cast holy spells? One who had belonged to the Mazoku before he was even out of the egg. 

"Regardless of who killed whom, I can't see Gaav having any interest in a true dragon, except possibly as an enemy," the old priest was saying. 

"Unless my parents consecrated me to him for some reason," I said grimly. "There are a couple of things I didn't tell you. One is that the voice, whoever it belongs to, is still there in my head. The other is that right before I passed out in the square, he said—addressing the brass demons, I think—'Serves you fuckers right for tangling with my priest.'" 

"Has the voice been unpleasant to you, lad? Harsh or insulting?" 

I shook my head. "Teasing a bit, in a rough kind of way, but . . . almost kind, other than that. He was the one who told me how many brass demons there were." 

"And did you ask the owner of the voice who he was?" 

"There hasn't been time." It was half a lie, and Father Teremar clearly knew it as well as I did, because he gave me a Look. "And I have a feeling I'm not going to like the answer," I added reluctantly. 

"The worst possible result would be that it truly is Gaav," the old priest said. "And if he's well-disposed toward you, you may be able to persuade him to let you go." 

"I'm not sure he can. He said something about having tried to sever the link between us just before he died, only it didn't work—" Before he'd died. Oh, shit. And he'd mentioned _Phibby_. Which could have been "Phibrizzo". Hellmaster. 

"Ask him," Father Teremar said firmly. "I can't do anything to help you except give advice. If you want to work things out, you need to negotiate with him." 

_Negotiate._ I bit back a laugh. "Fine, then. I think I'll go for a walk. I need to clear my head, and I'd prefer not to talk to him in front of you, because it would look like I'm talking to myself and I feel like enough of an idiot already." 

"Be careful." 

Outside, scudding cloud alternately veiled and revealed the moon. I unbuttoned my shirt and slid my arms out, letting it drop down to dangle from my belt, and released my wings. Spreading them wide, I took a half-dozen long, running steps down the pier, and launched myself onto the wind. 

I didn't fly very far. The Troll's Fist was a rock out near the edge of the harbour, inaccessible by boat except during the highest tides of the year, and I went there often when I wanted to be alone. 

And so I was standing on the tilted top surface of a rock when I spoke the question out loud to the night: "Are you Maryuuoh Gaav?" 

A soft snort. «Guess there's no way to soften the shock for you after all. Yeah, that's what they used to call me.» 

My hands flexed, sprouting talons. Damn. Damn it all! How was I supposed to deal with this? I could feel something that had never been all that strong breaking inside me again, strand by strand, and I knew that when it snapped completely, I would lose my mind. 

_You deserve it,_ an inner voice that wasn't Gaav's whispered. _Traitor. Mazoku-loving trash._

_Shut up shut up SHUT UP!_

My fingers were a blur in the moonlight as I unwrapped the bandages from my left wrist. Father Teremar suspected my other reason for having this conversation alone, I was sure, but I wasn't about to let him know for certain. Which meant leaving no evidence behind. 

I pressed my talons against fragile human skin, dimpling it. 

«Val?» 

The deep voice rumbling my name made my hands clench, breaking the skin a little more than I'd really intended. There was a sharp pain, and blood began to dribble down over my hand. It looked black in the moonlight. 

«Fuck, not this again!» 

There was a flash of red, and then a huge figure stood in front of me, blocking out the moon. Big hands, dragon-strong and rough with callus, grabbed my arms and pulled my talons from my skin. 

"Just what the fuck do you think you're doing, Val?"


	4. Chapter 3

"None of your business," I snapped, trying to pull my wrists loose. They wouldn't come. Gaav was stronger than I was, and really, why wouldn't he be? 

"Isn't it? Because it looks to me like you're vandalizing my property, little dragon." 

I stared up at him, astounded. He had thick, shaggy eyebrows, like caterpillars, that shadowed his eyes. Not that I expected to be able to tell what colour they were by moonlight, anyway, but it was a bit disconcerting not to be able to tell exactly where he was looking. Damn, he was big. Not just tall, but broad through the shoulders. Muscular, I'd bet, although he was wearing a long, loose coat that made it difficult to be sure of the details. 

" _Your_ property?" 

"This belongs to me, not you." He tugged at my wrists as he spoke. Just once, not hard, but I felt rage burst out inside me. 

" _Like hell!_ What do you think I am, your fucking livestock?!" I yanked hard, putting all the force I could muster into getting out of his grip, so much that I could feel bones grinding. When it didn't work, I kicked at him. I was half-surprised when it connected, and again when he grunted. Could he actually feel pain? 

"That's better. Be angry. Hate me if you have to. But no more of this despair shit—hear me? If I catch you trying to cut yourself open again, I'll make you wish you'd never been hatched." He let me go so abruptly that I stumbled back and landed on my ass with him looming over me. "I know you don't remember now, but long ago, in another life, you swore yourself to me, absolutely and without reservation—flesh and spirit, blood and bone. Body and soul. While the bond between us remains, you belong to me. And don't you fucking well forget it." 

"Screw the bond!" I snarled back at him, picking myself up. "You said yourself that you tried to break it! Isn't there any way to get rid of it?" 

Even with the shadows falling across his face, I could see him scowl, those heavy brows knitting. "Not without help. We need someone to help undo it from the outside, and I'm not talking about some random priest or sorcerer. Problem is, I'm not on speaking terms anymore with any of the beings that might be able to give us a hand." 

"The other Dark Lords?" 

"Or the Dragon Gods," he said with a shrug, turning to face out to sea. "If you really want to get rid of me, your best chance might be to appeal to Valwin, since he was your race's patron, but you're going to have a hell of a time just getting his attention. Since the Kouma War, all three of them have been hiding away in their pathetic little strongholds, shaking, and hoping that no one looks their way. They've convinced themselves that if they aren't doing anything, the Mazoku won't either." A snort told me what Gaav thought of that idea. "So you're going to have to find yourself a priest or priestess strong enough that Valwin can't ignore them, because I'm not going to smash my way into his tower and have Vrabazard and Rangort land on my head. I don't know how many times I've died now, but even one would have been too fucking many." 

My first thought was of Father Teremar, but although I might have called the old priest wise, I would never have considered him strong. However, he might know someone, or of someone. It was a place to start, anyway. 

" . . . Thank you," I said reluctantly, and Gaav snorted again. 

"You're no good to me like this, little dragon. I could force you to obey me, but if I'm going to go that route, I might as well just spawn another fucking Mazoku. You were valuable to me because you willingly placed yourself in my hands, and I'd rather lose you altogether than settle for less." 

I honestly didn't know what to say to him. I mean, he wasn't acting like I'd imagined a Dark Lord would. Instead, he was showing me . . . an odd, crooked kindness. 

_Ragradia used one of her dying spells to imprison Gaav within a human soul, as Ceiphied did to the broken shards of Ruby-Eye. But she was less skilled, or Gaav was stronger, and he eventually broke loose. The experience changed him, however, and once he escaped he broke his ties to the other Mazoku and began expressing an interest in ruling the world instead of destroying it._ A story I'd been told since I was a hatchling, but I'd never bothered to really think about it before. How deeply had he changed? How much of him was still Mazoku? 

_Long ago, in another life, you swore yourself to me._ Why? What had I seen in him then? Or was he just lying? 

He reached into his pocket, and when he drew it out, a soft, silvery light coming from between his fingers illuminated the surface of the rock on which we perched and infused everything with colour. Now I could tell that his outer garment was a long coat in a garish shade of yellow, that his long hair and the thick brows that shadowed his eyes were blood red, that the eyes themselves were blue with a hint of green. I also got my first good look at his face, saw a strong nose and chin, and a wide, mobile mouth. 

"I almost forgot about this. Here." He took my hand with one of his, pressed the glowing thing into my palm with the other. I blinked, because it was . . . a feather, or more properly, a feather-scale. I'd seen enough of my own shed ones to recognize the type. Except that mine were black, and the glowing one I now held looked like it was made from still-molten silver, although it was only just warm to the touch. The shaft of the feather was set in gold, allowing it to be hung on a chain. 

"What's this?" 

"You asked me for help in restoring your power, earlier. That represents the best I can do without making you feel like you've been flayed or fried." 

"And the feather?" 

Gaav smirked. "A little souvenir of the last time I tangled with Valwin. Really, it's a remnant of his power that makes it work. I just . . . twiddled it a bit." 

I slipped the chain over my head. It was long enough that the feather rested against the middle of my chest. I could feel a gentle warmth spreading from the place where it touched my skin. I'd have to meditate to figure out exactly what it was doing to my magic pool, if anything, but at least it might make a useful lamp or something. 

"Thanks," I said. Meaning it. I didn't get presents very often, so when someone gave me something, it was always a bit of a shock. 

"Idiot dragon," Gaav said, but it was with a grin on his face. "Look after yourself, okay? I'll be in touch." 

And then he just . . . wasn't there anymore, leaving me on the rock with my new feather pendant and a feeling of confusion. Because if that wasn't the weirdest conversation I'd ever had, it was pretty damned close. And I was only just starting to understand what the consequences might have been. I'd yelled at a Dark Lord, sworn at him . . . _kicked_ him, for Valwin's sake. A being with the power of a _god_ , who could have turned me into a fine dusting of ash by muttering a few words. If he would even have needed to do that. I'd seen Xellos cast spells by just waving his hand. 

And yet Gaav hadn't reacted to any of the things that now had me breaking out in a cold sweat. Well, he'd cursed a bit himself, but I got the impression that that was just the way he talked. 

_He . . . likes me?_

What a weird, disturbing thought. 

I shook my head. Well, I was alive, and what he thought about me hopefully wasn't going to matter for much longer. I launched from the rock and flew back toward what was left of Copper Cove. 

When I got back to the warehouse, Father Teremar was asleep, and I didn't have the heart to wake him. I could ask him questions in the morning. In the meanwhile, I found an empty pile of blankets and slapped a weak Sleeping spell on myself. If it didn't wear off on its own, I knew the old priest would wake me up. 

Which turned out to be exactly what happened. I woke up feeling refreshed, and cast two more Resurrections before I sat down for breakfast with Father Teremar. Tea and fish and a couple of plums—one of the inland orchards must have been producing, finally. I tucked in and waited patiently until no one was nearby before saying anything important. 

"Gaav and I had an interesting little conversation last night." 

Father Teremar had just taken a sip of tea, and coughed as it went down the wrong way. "Oh? What did he have to say?" 

"He was actually pretty friendly," I said, fingering the feather talisman. I'd determined that it really was having a positive effect on my recovery rate—if someone with a smaller power-pool, like Father Teremar, had been wearing it, they would go from white-haired and drained to full power in a couple of hours. "He told me that he really can't break the bond between us himself. He needs the help of another comparable power—a Dragon God or another Dark Lord. And he isn't on speaking terms with any of them. He suggested finding a strong priest or priestess and having them appeal to Valwin." 

Father Teremar set his teacup down. "And you have no idea where to find such a priest—that's clear just from the expression on your face. Well. 'Strong' should imply the power to do extensive holy magic—sincere prayer isn't enough, or I would be having conversations with the gods all the time. Unfortunately, I am one of the strongest sorcerers currently part of our Order, and as you know, I can only cast a handful of the weakest holy spells. Our magic is simply not all that well-developed, compared to that of the northerners." 

"Who have only had access to holy magic for the past twenty years," I pointed out . . . but there was a germ of an idea in there somewhere. I'd never been to the peninsula, the area inside the old Mazoku barrier, myself, but Lina Inverse had been from there and I'd heard a lot of stories concerning her, most of them told by people who had witnessed the events firsthand. The priest who had figured most prominently in them was Rezo, who was dead and had been a shard of Shabranigdo anyway, but Lina's companion Amelia had been a shrine maiden (although that seldom seemed to matter much in the stories), and there was also . . . "Sylphiel," I muttered, dredging the name up out of my memory. "Sylphiel nels Raada. The last priestess of Flagoon, by all accounts both a powerful sorceress and a very pious woman. Of course, I don't know where she is, whether I can convince her to help me, or even whether she's still alive, but it's a place to start. Unless you know someone . . . ?" 

Father Teremar shook his head. "If this Sylphiel is from inside the barrier, then she is likely your best hope. Do you know where to begin searching for her?" 

"Twenty years ago, she was living in the kingdom of Seyruun. There's a friend of my foster-mother's living there who may even be able to help me search, or suggest someone else if Sylphiel is . . . no longer available. Getting up there may take a while, though. There aren't that many ships that sail up past the Desert of Doom even now, and I'm either going to have to find myself a working passage, or work the docks until I scrape some money together." Or fly, but I'd never flown for more than two or three hours at a stretch and I was reluctant to make my first attempt over the ocean. "And I can't even start on that before I've healed everyone I can. Maybe I should hold the governor's son for ransom, assuming the bastard's fortune didn't go up with his mansion." 

"I think a lot of it got melted down, but gold and silver is still gold and silver." 

"Good point." Of course, we both knew I wouldn't do it. I wasn't that desperate. Getting Gaav out of my head was important, but since the Dark Lord seemed well-disposed toward me, it wasn't exactly _urgent_. 

I spent the rest of the day casting Resurrection, resting up to recover my magic pool, and then casting it again. Two dozen more times in all. If I could keep up the pace, I'd be finished in another day and a half. 

By midafternoon, my magic pool was dry, though, and I knew it was going to take more than a nap and a plate of herring to refill it for another casting this time. And I'd been in the hospital-warehouse all day and was starting to get claustrophobic. I had to get outside, at least for a little while. Father Teremar, once more sitting at the table by the door, waved me out without my needing to explain. 

Outside, there was a brisk wind whipping thin, high clouds around. I stretched and took a deep breath of air that smelled of the ocean rather than human sickness. The ocean and burning, that was. Even now, days later, there were threads of smoke rising from the rubble here and there. I hadn't been up the hill since I'd first woken up in the warehouse. Maybe it was time. 

The main road had either been cleared as part of rescue efforts or had simply been too wide for the rubble to choke it off completely, although most of it was down to half of its original width. A dusting of ash crunched under my feet as I crossed out of the largely undamaged warehouse area and into the lower edge of the burn zone. 

The buildings here, mostly shops with living space above them, were still standing, more or less. Wood was available on Dallangys Island, but it wasn't abundant, and so walls tended to be built of stone and the wood saved for boats and roof-beams. What those roof-beams supported varied widely: thatch, shingles of earthenware or costly imported cedar, or thin-beaten sheets of tin. Some of those had burned, some had melted, and some had fallen in when the beams supporting them had burnt out, leaving the buildings as shells open to the sky. Other buildings seemed intact except for scorch marks. Judging from what I saw through dangling storm shutters, the condition of the exterior guaranteed nothing about the interior, with some places burned out and some sporting, again, only char marks. 

I continued to climb, past the square (was that narrow clean space in the middle of the blackened paving stones where I'd been lying?) and up towards the temple. I was still a couple of blocks away, in the merchant district, when a breeze cold enough to send shivers down my spine wafted over me. It also made me gag, because it was carrying a smell with it that I could only describe as extraordinarily putrid. Worse than ten tons of rotting meat. 

"What the hell?" I said aloud, recoiling. 

"Smells like some of the brass demon corpses are still around," an increasingly familiar voice replied, and Gaav emerged from a narrow gap between two buildings. "Which is pretty fucking weird. Normally they should have rotted away to nothing by now. Something's keeping them in one piece." 

"Like what?" 

He shook his head. "I can't tell from here. Probably a trace of someone's power. Which might tell us who started this shit in the first place." 

"Does that mean you're going to take a look?" 

The Dark Lord chuckled. "You read my mind, little dragon. Sure, let's check it out." 

He had a huge sword slung across his back, I noted as we began to pick our way along a narrower street. That made me feel better for some obscure reason, although you would have thought that a giant Mazoku toting a weapon would be the least reassuring thing in the world. 

Why was I even following him? If anyone had asked me, I would have said I was worried that he might make even more of a mess of Copper Cove than the brass demons had, but I knew that was a convenient lie. I wanted to know what the hell was going on, and he seemed to be my first possible lead. 

After less than half a block, we were reduced to climbing over charred timbers and partially collapsed walls—the fire had been raging high by the time it had gotten up this far, and it hadn't been kind even to stones and mortar. I didn't understand why Gaav wasn't casting a Levitation spell, or whatever the Mazoku equivalent was, so that he could fly over this mess. Hell, I didn't even know why he'd picked this direction, although the smell did seem to be getting stronger. I gagged and switched to breathing through my mouth. 

We did a couple of blocks of that before the Dark Lord slowed to a stop outside a large building on a corner. It had belonged to a merchant specializing in curiosities, if I remembered correctly, acting as both a display area and a small-scale warehouse for his more valuable items. The fires hadn't been kind to it. From the look of it, the upper storey and the roof had both fallen in, and caused part of the ground floor to cave into what had probably been a basement. The still-standing walls of the ground floor were oddly black and white, with char and . . . frost? The air was certainly cold enough to make me shiver, and I was half-tempted to ask Gaav for the loan of his coat. 

"Something invested with a long-term Gray Buster in the process of burning itself out," the Dark Lord said. "A fucking nuisance, but not what we're looking for." 

I blinked. "It isn't? I would have thought that this much cold would be able to preserve just about anything." 

"Brass demon bodies are just barely physical. They fall apart into dust unless small amounts of astral energy get fed into them continuously, so cold alone won't preserve them. The only times I've run into rotting ones before were in the middle of battlefields where we'd all been throwing our power around." 

And the spell he'd helped me cast couldn't be the cause, because if it had we'd have a lot more demon bodies scattered around what was left of the town. So there was something else going on here. 

Gaav kicked the remains of the metal-banded door out of the way as he climbed the steps to the building's entrance. "Fuck," he muttered, staring at the mess inside. "Val, take whatever I chuck out of here and heave it further down the street so that we don't clog things up too much." 

_I don't take your orders._ "Can't you just blast it?" 

"Yeah, but your human friends might object if I start trashing people's bodies. There's at least one dead human mixed in here—I can see a hand sticking out of the mess, and there's blood spattered around." 

I scowled. "Shit. All right, do it however you want and I'll keep the junk from blocking the street any more than it is already." 

Okay, so I was used to heaving heavy objects around, but it kind of surprised me how easily we set up a rhythm, with Gaav tossing heavy stones or chunks of charred wooden beam at me, and me piling them out of the way. The Dark Lord was dragon-strong and tireless—not really surprising when you thought about it, but I'd never worked with anyone like that before. It was jarring when he suddenly stopped, frowning. 

"What's up?" I asked, dusting my hands off. I was filthy, coated with ash, but I figured I'd wash off in the pool up by the town reservoir later. Gaav didn't have so much as a smudge on that damned garish coat of his, though. Assuming the coat really existed at all. Either way, it wasn't fair, though. 

"I've got a pile of dead brass demons with parts of a human mixed in. Whatever power trace caused this shit is at the bottom of the pile, and I don't want the human remains coming in contact with it." 

"Why not?" 

"Depending on what it is, it could have weird effects. Thousands of zombie hands crawling around, that kind of thing. So the pile has to be pulled apart in order and the human bits put aside. I'm just trying to figure out the best way to tackle it." 

Zombie hands. Great. "I guess that means we start at the top." 

Gaav grunted an affirmative. "Once I make sure I really do have the top. It's a mess in here." 

"Oh?" I leaped for the ragged top of the wall, grabbing it with both hands to haul myself up. In retrospect, it wasn't the brightest thing I'd ever done. I was just settling myself on a perch when mortar crumbled, and I began to fall. 

I made it about three inches down into the interior of the building before scratchy-warm power reached out and caught me. 

"Reckless," Gaav grumbled as I floated across the shattered floor to be deposited lightly beside him. "But then, you always were." 

So negative personality traits could persist across incarnations—another thing that I would rather never have found out. 

I wrenched my thoughts away from that to look at what was in front of me. Not that that was much fun, because it was a pile of corpses, lying mostly inside what had been the cellar and was now an open pit. It took me a while to spot the human bits that Gaav had noticed—one hand lying a little way from the rest of the pile, on top of a broken chunk of stone, and a leg with a charred slipper still clinging to the foot poking out from somewhere deeper in the mass. 

We did get it all apart eventually. There had been two . . . human people . . . mixed in with the mess, an older man and woman. We laid the parts together in one pile—some of the chunks couldn't be identified as coming from one or the other anyway. They were just lumps of meat. The brass demons we disposed of by throwing the bodies hard up into the air. They fell apart somewhere around the forty-foot mark, disintegrating into dust. The chunks that came down intact, we set aside with the human parts. 

And at the bottom, we found . . . nothing. Or so I thought at first. Rubble, a smashed tea mug and a dented spoon. Fragments of glass with bits of gilding still clinging to them, the remains of what I knew had been a very expensive vase. 

Gaav crouched down and poked through the mess, big hands searching until he pulled out a bit of earthenware. He stared down at it, looking as perplexed as I felt. 

"Looks like part of a jar," I said. I'd seen a lot of broken vases and jars while I'd been living with Filia—shipments that had been handled roughly, stuff that had shattered in the kiln, "oopses" in the shop. "Probably a pretty ugly one." So ugly it was making the scales on the back of my neck hackle even though they weren't there just now. Or at least, I hoped that was what was doing it. 

"And it stinks of Hellmaster," Gaav growled. "Except that the little fucker's dead, so this must be part of something that he infused with his power. This is the only part of it here, though." 

"Did they get it?" I didn't have to understand what was going on to know that that probably wouldn't be a good thing. 

He shook his head. "Feels like it left here a lot longer ago than just a couple of days. Of course, with the fucking records so much charcoal and the owner in pieces, I doubt we'll ever figure out where it went." 

"That's that, then, I guess," I said. "I'll keep an eye out for ugly earthenware jars with broken handles." 

"Fair enough. I'll be—" 

"In touch. I know." I was surprised the next moment that I'd had the balls to interrupt a Dark Lord, but Gaav barely even seemed to notice. He stayed where he was, frowning at the thing in his hand, while I got the hell out of there. 

I could feel myself getting sucked into whatever this crap was, and I didn't want to be involved. I'd heard too many Lina-Inverse-world-saving stories as a young hatchling, and I knew the whole business was hell. What went on inside my head was nasty enough without deliberately going out and putting myself in danger. 

I just wanted a normal life, damn it all, or as normal as a dragon who was also the last of his species could hope for. Free of the darkness that had hung over me all my life. Without Dark Lords talking to me, either in person or in my head. 

Was that really too much to ask?


	5. Chapter 4

The entire town took up a collection to pay for my trip north. When I found out, I was . . . well, "stunned" doesn't entirely cover it. I hadn't expected anyone to care, healing spells or no healing spells. Just the idea was enough to make me wonder if I'd fallen into another world. 

I didn't have any luggage, either—everything had burned up along with the temple annex. Currently, I owned one cotton shirt, one pair of homespun trousers, a belt, a pair of rope sandals, the leather thong that tied back my hair, and a weird feather-pendant-charm. But surprisingly, the temple sanctuary had survived structurally intact, and so I found myself there in the dark of the early morning, standing in front of Valwin's smoke-blackened shrine, fiddling with the feather that dangled against my chest and searching for something to say. "I need your help" wasn't likely to stand out among all the other pleas he got on a daily basis, and "you'd better damned well help me, you asshole, or I'm going to rip your hat off your head and stomp on it" struck me as . . . not constructive. And I doubted either prayer would do any real good. Not after what had happened here. 

I found myself looking anywhere but at the Airlord's shrine. Or the Firelord's or the Earthlord's. They made me . . . so angry. _You could have helped! Why didn't you help?!_

I'd finished off yesterday by helping to dig a hole to bury the last batch of unidentifiable rotting bodies they'd pulled out of the wreckage of one of the poorer residential districts. A lot of them had been little kids. And they—the beings that these shrines represented—had left them to die. At least Gaav had tried to do something. But in addition to pissing me off, seeing Valwin's unwillingness to lift a finger here didn't exactly make me optimistic about getting any aid out of him. 

I turned slowly to the Aqualord's altar. 

"I know you can't hear me," I said. _The dead have no ears._ "But I wonder . . . did you do it on purpose? Cram him into a body and stick him with a soul because your brothers weren't _doing_ anything? Or did they only start to act that way after you died?" 

Good thing I wasn't expecting an answer, because I didn't get one. I sighed and left the temple, jogging down the street towards the harbour. 

The main street was completely clear of rubble now, and the buildings were slowly being cleared, stripped of anything useful and the debris discarded. Although no one was actually working at this hour of the morning, you could see the evidence: neat stacks of earthenware tiles, a stone table piled with blackened-but-sound pots and tableware, a dented metal bucket filled with shattered glass bits destined to be sold as scrap and melted down. Eventually the entire burned area would be stripped and the stone shells of the buildings either scrubbed down and repaired or knocked down and rebuilt. Maybe after I was done with my errand in the north, I'd come back for a visit and see what they'd done with the place. 

A visit only, yes. Dallangys Island had been good to me, but if I was . . . healed . . . then I wanted something more. Although I wasn't sure what that would be, not yet. 

There were people stirring down by the harbour, around the ships preparing to leave on the dawn tide. Two merchantmen. One was headed for Alto with a transshipped cargo of baled raw wool, and the other, on which I'd booked my passage, was loaded copper ingots bound for Tishan in Elmekia, on the far side of the Desert of Death. That wouldn't put me anywhere near Seyruun, I knew, but at least I would be able to walk the remaining distance, or fly safely over land and not water. 

I was three-quarters of the way along Pier Eight, alongside the stern of the _Aleare_ , when I realized that there was someone else there who wasn't a sailor. And he was watching me. 

"You," I growled at the ridiculously tall figure in the trench coat. "What are you doing here?" 

"I'm coming with you." Gaav raised an eyebrow at me, as though daring me to say something about it. 

I gave him a cold glare. "Why? Do you think I need a keeper, or something?" 

"Maybe I just want a free lunch," he said, smirking. That damned smirk. I wanted to wipe it off his face, but I didn't quite dare try. He'd let me get away with kicking him, that night on the rock, but there hadn't been any witnesses then. No sailors hanging around watching covertly as they prepared for departure. "The emotions of a pissed-off dragon are pretty damned tasty to a Mazoku, you know. Sort of like a well-aged cheese." 

"So human anger isn't good enough for you?" 

The Dark Lord chuckled. "Oh, that's a different flavour altogether—kind of like a soft cheese with hot peppers. I'm far from a gourmet, but I like the taste of rage and bloodlust. Built that way, I guess. So, are you getting on this ship, or do you want to fly after it?" 

I rolled my eyes and headed for the gangplank, still resting on the dock, although the tide rising under the ship had caused it to tilt at a steep angle. Gaav followed me at an unhurried pace. I put my foot on the gangplank, then stopped. 

"I'm not going to pay for your passage," I told the Mazoku, who snorted. 

"I'm not that poor, Val. Hell, I could have paid for you, too, but I had a feeling you wouldn't appreciate it." 

"I thought you liked how my anger tastes," I retorted. 

He shrugged. "I can only consume so much at a time, so why let it go to waste by making you generate more?" 

"Admit it, you want to keep an eye on me." _Because of this,_ I didn't say, but I touched the bandages wound around my wrist with the fingers of the opposite hand. 

"It's safer not to travel alone," he said, with another shrug. "And knowing just how trouble tends to form up around you, I prefer to be there to stop it before it starts, rather than having to sweep in to pick up the pieces once you've gotten yourself in too deep to handle things on your own. Plus, if there's some conspiracy going on among Hellmaster's ex-followers, being connected to me makes you a potential target. So either I stay with you on the physical, or I watch you from the astral, and I thought you'd be happier if you could tell when I was around." 

I couldn't argue with that part. I'd been having creepy feelings for the past several days whenever I thought about him watching me without me being able to tell he was doing it. This was better . . . or it would have been if it wasn't just about guaranteed to remind me of his existence every time I turned around. 

I hated knowing I was magically bound to a Dark Lord, the general of Shabranigdo's armies. One of the most evil beings ever to exist. I doubted acquiring a human soul had changed him all that much. But there was nothing I could do to change that right now, and that knowledge just made me madder. 

I growled softly, and forced myself to climb the rest of the way onto the deck of the ship, where I was immediately stopped by one of the sailors. From the badge pinned to his shirt, he was probably the second mate. 

"You're the passengers? We were starting to think we were going to have to leave you behind," the sailor said. "I'm Lentrian Greenwave, second mate. Judging from what the captain said, you'd be Val—" He pointed at me. "—and you, Gavin, right? Hope you don't mind sharing a cabin—this is a working ship, and we don't have a lot of space." 

"Doesn't bother me," Gaav rumbled. 

"I'll find somewhere to curl up on deck or in the hold if this big lug's snoring starts to get on my nerves," I said with a scowl, and Gaav grinned. 

The cabin was big enough that we had separate beds . . . sort of. Two bunks, one above the other, neither large enough to accommodate a man of Gaav's size. 

"Guess I'm sleeping on the floor," he said as he ducked through the doorway. 

"I'm sorry about that, sir," the second mate said. 

Gaav shrugged. "It happens often enough, so I can't afford to let it bother me much." 

The second mate didn't seem to know what to say to that, in the end producing, "Please stay in here until we clear the harbour, both of you. If you get in the way of operations on deck, we could end up missing the tide. And don't open the porthole, please—you're near the water line here." 

It was no more than I'd expected, so I crossed the room and sat down firmly on the lower bunk, making it clear that I wasn't going anywhere. Gaav went over to that porthole and sank down onto his knees. The second mate nodded and left, closing the door behind him. 

" _Do_ you sleep?" I asked him, genuinely curious. 

"Sort of. Normal Mazoku just withdraw their physical projection when they enter a resting state, but I'm permanently tied to the physical, so when I rest, this body appears to sleep. Part of me is still conscious while that's going on, though. It's complicated, like most of my existence these days." 

So stabbing him to death in his sleep wasn't likely to rid me of him. Mind you, him ending up dead hadn't broken this stupid link between us the first time. 

I flopped back on the bunk. "Well, I hope you brought a deck of cards or something, _Gavin_ —have I mentioned yet what a stupid alias that is?—or else we're going to have a really boring trip. I could play cat's cradle, I guess, but that gets kind of tedious after a few hours." And I hadn't brought any string, but I was sure the sailors would be glad to supply me with a couple of feet of it if it kept me out of their hair. 

The Mazoku snorted. "I think I can manage that, but I sure as hell hope your poker game's improved." 

Instead of poker, we ended up playing backgammon, of all things, using a set of well-worn bone and wood counters and yellowed narwhal-ivory dice. Gaav was a skilled, aggressive player—hardly surprising when you considered his temperament and how many centuries of practice he must have had—and tended to win unless I got a lucky series of rolls. 

It was always on the tip of my tongue to ask him questions: _What was our relationship before? Why was I so desperate that I swore myself to a Mazoku? Have you learned anything more about that jar fragment we found?_ But I bit them all back. I didn't want to acknowledge my own curiosity about him or anything to do with him. I was not a Mazoku-worshipper, damn it all! 

Thankfully, Gaav didn't talk much about anything except the game we were playing. He seemed to want me to be . . . not uncomfortable, at least, if not precisely at ease. 

We were served a meal that was approximately breakfast—bacon, bread, raisins, probably the same as the crew ate—after a couple of hours, and told that we were well enough away that it was safe to go up on deck. I couldn't leave the cabin quickly enough, and I think Gaav was just as glad to get out from under the low ceiling that didn't quite allow him to straighten up. 

I found a place where I wouldn't be in the way of the crew, in the shadow of one of the ship's boats, and just stood there and let the wind ruffle my hair. At least I was underway. At least now, something might change. I could handle having an annoying sidekick for a while, if it got me to where I wanted to be. Or was I his sidekick? _He'd_ probably think so. I growled softly and glared at Gaav's back, trying to bore a hole in that huge sword he carried slung across it. Neither he nor the weapon seemed to notice. 

With the sails now set, there was a fair amount of free deck space, and Gaav, after surveying the area for a bit, chose a chunk of it and drew his sword. Several of the crew members moved back warily, but when he began to swing it at the empty air, they seemed to grasp that this was only a practice session. 

I watched him for a while, and I got the impression that he was good, although what I knew about swordplay would fit in a thimble with leftover space for several grains of rice. My foster-mother hadn't approved of my learning weapons, and Jillas and Gravos, who might have been willing to teach me on the sly, were only skilled with guns and fists, respectively. I'd learned a little about hand-to-hand, but nothing much else, even after I'd left home. 

Gaav, though . . . "Graceful" wasn't a term I would have expected to apply to him, but with a weapon in his hands, he was. Light on his feet, balanced, moving easily and smoothly. The roll of the ship didn't seem to bother him, either. And the expression on his face was one of pure pleasure. I actually felt a little envious. _I wonder if he'd teach me, if I asked._ The Chaos Dragon was probably the most experienced fighter in the world, his love of war legendary. If I wanted to learn more about the arts of violence, I couldn't ask for a better teacher . . . and I did want to learn. Fighting was one of the few things that could make me forget everything else. 

I shook my head, trying to dislodge that thought. Was I losing my mind? The last thing I wanted was a closer association with this . . . being. Even if he hadn't done anything unpleasant or atrocious so far, I was certain it was only a matter of time. 

My wrist itched, and I absently rubbed it through the bandages. It was really healing, instead of just held together by spells, for the first time in a long time. I hadn't felt the need to use my talons on myself since that night out on the Troll's Fist. Maybe it was because I felt like I had some control over my life now. The guilt finally made _sense_. I mean, how could I . . . with him . . . I had to have been the worst traitor in the history of the dragon race, but I had a chance to start over now, and I wasn't going to blow it. 

The first three days of the trip were uneventful. I played a lot of board, card, and dice games, with Gaav and with off-duty members of the crew. After getting permission from the captain, I'd climbed the rigging from time to time, to gaze out over the ocean and at the shoreline of the Desert of Destruction, just visible in the distance off to starboard. Gaav did snore, but less than I expected, so I had no trouble sleeping. And I didn't dream. 

The fourth day was a bit different. First of all, clouds started to gather on the horizon. They didn't look like much to me, but the sailors seemed to think there was a storm coming, and the captain grimaced and gave the order to run for shore—apparently his charts said we weren't too far from a cove that would protect us from the worst of it, although (as the sailors grumbled), we were likely to end up with an inch of wind-blown sand on deck for them to scrub away. That had been going on for an hour or so when a cry came down from the crow's nest. 

"A sail! A sail!" 

Now, that wasn't so unusual—we were in a major shipping corridor, and had passed a couple of other merchantmen close enough to exchange signals. I could barely make out the words anyway, not through a layer of wood down in the cabin, where we'd been sent after the captain decided to turn the ship. 

Gaav was frowning, brows knit, and staring at nothing, his fingers drumming on the floor. He usually sat or knelt when we were inside, to keep from bashing his head against the ceiling, so the boards were within easy reach. 

"Guess the other guy got the same idea our captain did," I said from my position on the lower bunk. 

The Mazoku shook his head. "Something isn't right." 

"What?" I asked, startled. 

"Fucked if I know, but there's a lot of agitation on the astral. Something's wrong with that ship. Could be Mazoku-related, or just a ghost ship or some other kind of crap like that. Hopefully the captain won't get too near it." 

"Is there any way you can check?" 

Gaav snorted. "Of course there is, but for all I know that might be Dolphin's fucking leviathan galley, and if I start probing _that_ , I'm going to get noticed. I'm not in a situation where I can afford to pick fights with the others right now, not before I build up some kind of power base again. Sucks, but there you have it." 

Suddenly, there was a grating crunch. 

"I don't think that's good," I said. 

"Neither do I," Gaav said grimly, hunching over as he rose to his feet. "Let's go up on deck and see what we hit. The captain'll be pissed off, but personally, I don't give a flying fuck." 

Neither did I, right now. If the ship turned out to be sinking, I wanted to be able to fly off. An underequipped flight over the Desert of Destruction was likely to be hellishly unpleasant, but I knew Aqua Create backwards and forwards, so I'd probably survive the couple of days it would take me to get to southern Elmekia. I just wouldn't enjoy it. 

The ship heaved as we stumbled up the stairs, throwing me against the wall. Behind me, Gaav cursed. He'd probably hit his head. Served him right. 

A moment later, I swore too. I didn't have to ask what that smell was, because I'd come across it before, and recently: dead bodies. To be exact, it was the smell of flesh that had been left to rot for several days. What was going on here? And there was thick fog covering the deck, making it impossible to see more than a few feet. 

There were sails drooping across the deck, and I was pretty sure they didn't belong to the _Aleare_. Our captain kept things ship-shape. He wouldn't put up with tattered canvas like this, or the green-black spots that mottled it. 

"Ghost ship," Gaav said. "And not one of the nicer kind." 

"There are nice kinds of ghost ships?" I asked sarcastically. 

"Yeah, actually, there are. On the nice ones, the ghosts are interested in fighting each other and don't give a fuck about outsiders. On the bad ones, the ghosts are united and have it in for someone outside their own group. Those are the nasty ones, like we've got here. And I doubt they're going to be able to tell we're not the ones we're looking for. I think our ship's stuck to theirs somehow—magic, they rammed us, or we rammed them." 

"Does it matter how they're being held together?" 

"If we want to get this ship loose. Or we could just get the fuck out of here and leave the sailors to their own devices. Travelling overland up the coast here isn't too bad so long as you go to ground during the middle of the day." 

"I'm staying, until I'm sure that there's nothing I can do to help." 

Gaav sighed. "Damned dragon. Fine, fine. There's a bunch of living humans over that way." He waved his hand in the general direction of the front of the ship. "Don't attack anything until you know what it is. Given the smell, I'm betting on zombies, and it's going to be hard for you to tell them from an injured sailor in this shit." 

He drew his sword and propped the bare blade against his shoulder before striding forward into the fog. I followed him quickly, letting a partial transformation roll down my arms and turn my hands into talons. 

There was a low moan from our left as we passed one of the ship's boats, and I stopped and turned sharply to face the noise. "Who's there?" 

"G-greenwave . . . Oh, Waterlord, finally someone alive . . . You're the passengers, aren't you?" 

"What happened?" I couldn't actually see him yet, although the shadow of the boat was becoming more concrete. 

"We were working the canvas hard when the lookout called a sail," the second mate said. "We figured it was someone else running for the cove, but the captain didn't like the look of the ship and told us to steer clear. Before we could, all of a sudden there was this fog around us in spite of the wind . . . Wasn't natural, but what could we do? We were already moving too fast . . . and then they slammed into the port bow, and we could all smell the rot . . ." He made a sobbing sound, and then continued, "We knew there were death ships around here, of course . . . always have been . . . but they never . . . All these zombies on deck . . . I knocked the head off one with a belaying pin, but another one slashed my leg open . . . Took cover here, because I knew we'd gotten the boats up north and they've got protective spells on them. Ordered the men to the forecastle without telling them how bad I was." 

He had to be under the boat's canvas cover. I peeled it back, and revealed the face and body of the man who had guided us to our cabin only a few days ago. 

"I'm going to heal him," I told Gaav, who grunted. 

"Waste of time, in my opinion, but go ahead. Just stick to Recovery." 

"I'm not going to exhaust myself," I snapped. 

"That isn't what I'm worried about, little dragon. Resurrection pulls life force from the surroundings. When there're a lot of undead around, it can behave a bit funny." 

I didn't bother asking him what _funny_ meant, because I could come up with several scenarios for myself, and all of them were gruesome. Gaav took up a guard stance, facing out across the deck, while I did my best to patch up Greenwave's leg. It was covered with deep lacerations, some of them right to the bone. They looked like claw marks. 

"Do you think this ship is holed below the waterline?" the Mazoku suddenly asked. "And if it is, do you think we can patch it up well enough to limp into port?" 

Greenwave grimaced. "My guess would be yes, and no. They hit us pretty good." 

"Fuck. Then our best bet is probably to take the ghost ship."


	6. Chapter 5

"Take it," I said slowly. "As in take it over? Is that even possible?" 

"Bet your ass it is. We just have to find the center of the disturbance and deal with it—usually it's the captain. At least with a zombie ship we won't have to worry about it disintegrating afterwards." 

"W-we don't?" Greenwave said. 

Gaav shrugged. "Zombies are solid, so the hull has to be too. Ships like this sink to the bottom once the planking rots through. Deep-Sea Dolphin collects them from the bottom and puts them in bottles . . . or so they say." 

I blinked. "Why would she bother?" 

"How the fuck should I know? Why does anyone collect anything they can't use? Right now we've got better things to do than talk about shit like that, anyway. Greenwave, you go to the forecastle. Rally your crew and try to keep them from being killed—we can't sail a ship the size of these ones with only two or three people. Rule of thumb is, if it talks and manages to sound reasonably normal, it's probably alive. Zombies, even the ones that still have tongues, sound like brainless idiots talking through a mouthful of mush. And don't let them bite you. If someone does get bitten, cut off the part with the toothmarks off right away. If you can't, throw him overboard, 'cause he's a dead man anyway. Val and I are going to handle the other ship." 

"Hey!" I snapped as Greenwave began to move away. "I didn't say I was going to come with you!" 

Gaav shrugged. "You can stay here if you like, and watch the zombies eat the crew. After all, you're a dragon—a lame-ass curse like this one won't be able to do much to hurt you, even if you do get bitten. Of course, if you _do_ come with me, things should go faster, and not as many of the crew will die. Your choice." 

"Fuck you," I growled. But when he headed for the place where the prow of the ghost ship was embedded in the side of the _Aleare_ , I followed him, leaping over the hole where the deck had collapsed at the point of impact and vaulting the ghost ship's surprisingly intact railing to land beside him on its weathered deck. 

Suddenly I had a feeling that a whole bunch of eyes were looking at us. _Oh, hell . . ._ "Diem Wind!" I cast, and the fog was torn violently away. Only for a few seconds, but that was long enough. Long enough for me to see that there were at least a couple of dozen zombies scattered across the deck, and all of them were staring at us. 

"Incoming!" Gaav warned sharply as the fog closed in around us again, deadening the sound of booted feet. Booted _dead_ feet. I let part of a transformation roll over me, covering my neck and torso in scales to match my arms. Hopefully if one of them tried to bite me when I was like this, I'd just break its teeth. 

"Take the heads off them if you can," Gaav told me as his sword swung down and bisected a shadow. "They stop moving if you do that, or if you split the head open, even though they're not using the sludge in there to think with . . . If you can't manage that, tear off the arms and legs. They're a lot less dangerous that way, although the stray hands can be a nuisance." 

"Right." I was still pissed off at the big, callous, red-haired bastard, but I knew this wasn't the time. I turned to put my back to his—I had to trust him to keep them off me, or we were both going down. After that, I just slashed with my talons at anything that appeared out of the fog, over and over again until the head popped off. Fortunately, while the zombies might be disturbing to look at, they weren't very good fighters—slow-moving and prone to falling apart. After turning a few into rotting meat chunks, I realized that they were wearing what might have once been uniforms. 

"Just what we need—spoiled leftovers from someone's navy," Gaav said, apparently coming to the same conclusion. "Well, at least that should make it easy to tell which one is the fucking captain." Each swing of his sword took out one zombie, except for the big sideways slashes that could cut through two or three necks. When he shifted, I moved with him without thinking, as though we'd done this a hundred times before. "And there aren't as many of them coming up from behind, so maybe we're finally getting to the end of this batch. There's probably more down below, on the gundeck and in the hold, but they usually don't have enough brains to open doors. Or else they can't grip the latches without their hands falling apart." 

"How can they even find us?" I didn't like asking him questions, but I was afraid I might actually need to know the answer to that one before we got out of here. 

"Fucked if I know—heat? Scent? I never dealt in this kind of shit. It's more Phibby's style." 

Something about that bothered me, but there was no time to think as I cut down more naval zombies. 

I think we must have destroyed a hundred of them. Maybe more. If they'd come at us all together, they might have overwhelmed us, but they didn't have the brains . . . and the few times that there seemed to be too many, Gaav sent a bunch of them tumbling back with a wave of his free hand. None of them managed to get a bite in. Well, okay, one of them bit Gaav's _hair_ , mistaking it for who-the-hell-knew-what. He beheaded that one and shook off the head with a scowl that should have made it fall apart into dust. 

And then I was panting and dripping sweat on the deck and we were out of zombies. _Now what?_ I wondered as Gaav wiped his forehead with the back of his hand. 

Gaav kicked the pile of bodies. "Since none of them were wearing any fancy shit on their uniforms—not that _I_ saw, anyway—we're going to have to check the rest of the ship. Quarterdeck first, then the officers' cabins. Fuck, I hope we don't have to go below." 

"Couldn't you just wave your hand and get rid of them all?" I asked irritably—irritably because I'd just forgotten, _again_ , exactly who this man was. 

"What part of 'trying to keep a low profile' is too fucking difficult for you to understand? Besides, it's more interesting this way. When you've been around for tens of thousands of years, you tend to bore really easily." 

"So you let people die because you're bored?" 

Gaav rolled his eyes and began to pick his way across the deck. "Give me a fucking break, Val! They die anyway. Every day. Humans are fragile and they don't last long . . . I guess you're still too young in this lifetime to understand what that really means. Sure, if I exerted myself, I could postpone more humans' deaths for a while. So could you—you've got quite a bit of power in your own right, you know. So why don't you set yourself up in a slum somewhere and burn yourself out healing the poor? You're just as selfish as I am." 

I growled wordlessly. Because he was right. I'd pitched in to heal the injured in Copper Cove because it was an emergency, but it wasn't something I wanted to do for a living, no matter how good at it I was. 

_What_ do _I want to be?_ It occurred to me to wonder that, maybe for the first time ever, as I followed the big Mazoku across the weathered deck of the ghost ship. All my life, I'd been focused on what I wasn't. On the guilt. If the world did open up in front of me, if I was finally free of Gaav, if everything changed . . . what would I do? Where would I go? 

Those questions were one hell of a lot scarier than the ghost ship or anything on it. Including Gaav himself. 

The quarterdeck, just behind the main mast, yielded a few more zombies, including one in a slightly more elaborate uniform that had been manning the wheel, but when Gaav hacked it apart and the fog didn't dissipate, we decided it must not have been the captain. We were going to have to look elsewhere. And a brief check of the poop deck at the very rear of the ship, accomplished with the aid of another Diem Wind, showed that it was eerily empty. 

That meant we had to start opening doors. And the obvious place to start was the big stern cabin reserved for the captain. 

Rather than lifting the latch, Gaav kicked the door to the sterncastle out of its frame, causing it to hit the far wall inside with a _crunch-squish_ as a zombie was crushed between the two wooden surfaces. That put us in a narrow hallway with two other doors offset on either side and ladders descending further below deck at either end. And a couple more zombies, but Gaav's handwave spell sent them tumbling down the ladders, which he then barred off with some other kind of magic. 

"So what do you think, Val? Door number one or door number two?" 

"You say things like that just to piss me off, don't you?" I replied, and grabbed the nearest doorhandle. 

Well, it was probably the captain's cabin. It took up half this floor of the sterncastle; had a double-sized bed, a couple of overstuffed chairs, a small dining table set up to seat four, and a lot of windows; and was empty of any zombies. 

"I guess we try the door on the right," I said to Gaav, who was closer to it. He was also bent over at what had to be an uncomfortable angle, and I almost laughed as I realized what the _real_ reason he hadn't wanted to go below probably was. Hell, the top of _my_ head was only a couple of inches from the ceiling. I wondered why he'd chosen to be so tall . . . or were Mazoku like dragons, with a "natural" human form they didn't consciously choose? 

"Fuck," the Mazoku muttered, and lifted the latch. 

The temperature in the hallway dropped by at least five degrees, and suddenly we were under attack . . . from knee level. Gaav kicked the streak of black and white, and it hit the wall with a crunch and a thick-sounding yelp. There was another crunch as he stepped on its head, faster than I could register _zombie dog_. Well, better safe than sorry, I suppose. 

" _Are you the ones?_ " The voice from beyond the door was thick-sounding, but not difficult to understand. Maybe the cold had provided for better preservation than what we'd seen up on deck. " _Are you the ones who did this to us?_ " 

I sidled a little toward Gaav so that I could stick my head past the doorframe for a look, and discovered that the other half of the floor had a desk, a table covered with nautical charts, even more windows . . . and one zombie, staring at us with empty eye sockets. Other than the eyes and the greenish-grey skin, this one was well-preserved, downright lifelike. Male human, probably in his forties, around my height, narrow face, hair dark with just a touch of grey at the temples. His uniform, light grey with multiple bands of gold braid on each sleeve, was pristine, down to the crisp creases in the trouser legs and the well-shined boots. If this wasn't the captain, he had to be an admiral or something. 

"Nah, we're just the cleanup crew," Gaav said easily. "Mind telling us what the fuck happened here? Not that it matters much, but I'm curious." 

It seemed to take the zombie captain a while to process that, so maybe his brains weren't as well-preserved as the rest of him. "The curse. The curse of Zoamelgustar . . ." 

I blinked. _The curse of_ what _?_

"The fuck . . . ?" Gaav muttered, as though continuing my thought. "You didn't run into a crazy chick who dresses in homemade bondage gear and wears her hair in spiral green ringlets, did you? She'd be about forty now, I guess." 

"Not a woman. A young man . . . green hair . . . and a hat . . . He opened the jar, and it sucked the life from us . . ." 

"What jar?" I asked sharply. 

The zombie made a gurgling sound. Laugh? Sigh? "Just a plain jar with a broken handle . . . He said it belonged to the Monstrous Zoamelgustar . . ." 

Gaav snorted. "Not unless the fucker's had a name change recently. Look, you know you're dead, right?" 

The zombie took a step back. "Not . . . entirely. Not—" 

I crouched down and placed both my hands flat on the floor. "Holy wind which blows through the land, let all things be filled with your pure breath," I muttered. And then, louder, " _Van Rail!_ " 

The ice crackled across the floor, and there was a thick cry that was choked off again almost immediately. I sat back on my heels and checked the room beyond the door again, and saw the zombie captain embedded inside the ice crystal I'd just created, his mouth open in a silent scream and his hand frozen in the process of drawing the ceremonial sword that hung at his hip. 

"Good one," Gaav said, with an approving grin, and I smirked back, feeling warm all over. The next moment, I forced it to become a scowl instead. Why the hell should having _his_ approval make me feel good? 

The big Mazoku lashed out with his sword. When it struck the ice crystal, the ice shattered into a thousand pieces, some of which also contained zombie bits. So the ghost ship's captain was dead. The room didn't warm up any, and probably wouldn't until the spell dissipated, but I heard a bunch of thuds and the sound of the wind rising, and the atmosphere seemed to relax. 

Gaav slid his sword back into its scabbard, bending almost double in order to get enough clearance. I expected him to push past me and head out on deck, but instead he stuck his hand in his pocket and pulled out an ugly piece of earthenware. One that I recognized. A handle, found buried under a pile of dead brass demons. 

"That Zoamel-whatsis is just imaginary," he rumbled. "But that doesn't mean its name can't be used as a cover for someone else's power. A remnant of Ragradia actually pulled that on me just before . . . Anyway, I get the impression that what's using that name this time is a lot less benign." 

"Hellmaster," I said. It came out almost as a growl. 

"Or at least some remnant of his. Fuck. Like this world isn't squirelly enough without bits of Phibby still floating around. Looks like I've got some hunting to do, after we deal with your problem." 

I shook my head. "My business can wait. For now, we're both going after that jar." 

Gaav looked at me, his gaze disconcertingly sharp. "Are you sure that's what you want?" 

I met those eyes of his steadily. "If we don't track it down, this is just going to happen again, isn't it? You think I want that on my conscience?" 

He shrugged. "It isn't like I have a conscience myself, so I only know so much about the care and feeding of the fucking little nuisances. But if you're okay with dealing with the jar first, I certainly don't mind. Still, you realize it's going to be dangerous—and you're wandering around unarmed." 

"My talons have always been good enough so far," I pointed out. 

"For weak crap like zombies and dockside brawlers, sure. I don't really need a sword for those either—it just speeds things up. But sooner or later we're going to land in a real fight, and I'd be happier if you had more options." He straightened up—reflexively, I think—and his head hit the ceiling with a _thunk!_ "Fuck! Let's go outside first, or I'm going to start blasting holes in this place just so that I can get the crick out of my neck." 

Outside, the day was now sunny, the sky blue, and a gentle breeze was blowing from the west. Back on the crippled _Aleare_ , the sailors were throwing bits of zombie overboard under the direction of the captain and the second mate. No sign of the first mate, though. Maybe she'd been eaten. I clenched my hands so tightly that my nails bit into the skin of my palms. I should have been able to finish this before anyone got killed! If I'd stayed on deck, I might have been able to destroy the zombie ship before— 

"Don't tell me," Gaav rumbled. "You're blaming yourself for shit that isn't your fault again. If anyone should have picked up on this before everything went to hell, it's me. But I didn't. So now we've got to move from an uncomfortable berth on one ship to an uncomfortable berth on another. Good thing neither of us has any luggage." 

"How can you be so _calm_?" I growled at him. "People _died_." 

I was nearly pinned to the deck by a pair of cold, ocean-blue eyes. "I told you before. Humans die. All the time. If we hadn't been here, they would still have run into this—" Gaav tapped his foot against the planking. "—and they would still have ended up dead. Probably all of them, not just the ones who didn't manage to hang on until we turned the captain into frozen fishmeal. The ones that are still alive are that way because we _saved_ them. It'd be enough to ruin my fucking reputation, if I had one left that was worth mentioning." 

We . . . saved them. 

Why did that idea feel so strange? 

Slowly, one finger at a time, I forced my hands to unclench. Slowly, the red marks on my palms faded away. I looked up, and found that Gaav was still watching me soberly. 

"So," I said, desperate to talk about something, anything, else. "You wanted to talk weapons?" 

Weirdly enough, I was glad to see that damnable smirk of his back again. "You ever use anything? In this lifetime?" 

I shook my head. "I've clubbed people with random crap a couple of times, but I wouldn't really say that counts." 

"Neither would I. Hmm. I know what you used to work best with, but it isn't a simple weapon, and I don't know how much work you're willing to put into mastering it this time around. If you don't train, giving you something like that would just be inviting you to cut your own foot off." His expression was challenging, and something inside me responded to it with a sharp flare of anger and pride. 

"If work is what it takes, I'll work myself to the bone," I growled. 

Gaav's smirk widened. "That's the Val I used to know. Okay, take these." And a pair of swords suddenly appeared in his hands. 

I reached out and accepted them. They were clearly a set, in identical black metal scabbards with an iridescent finish. The longer one was a standard-enough longsword if you ignored the fact that its guard was an odd oval shape rather than a standard cross-piece and it didn't have a pommel, but the shorter one was the oddest sword I'd ever seen, with a hilt that might have been longer than its short, curved blade. 

"One for each hand?" I asked Gaav. 

"That's actually one of the more advanced ways of using them. Bring the hilts together at the pommel ends." 

I tried that, and raised my eyebrows as the slightly narrower end of the odd shortsword's hilt slid inside that of the longsword. 

"Now give the short one a half-twist away from you." 

When I did that, something clicked. 

"That locks them together as a rigid unit," Gaav said. "If you want to unlock them, you have to pinch the indentations on the short one before you twist. You wouldn't want them to come apart in the middle of a fight, after all—that would be a fucking mess. That's the most basic way of using them, that and using the long blade as a normal sword. There's another mode that involves using the short one as a throwing weapon, but we'll save that until you've got the basics down." 

Not a simple weapon, he'd said. Right. It did feel surprisingly natural in my hands, which had slid without my thinking about it to a position separated by three or four inches. Playing with it a bit, I could see how it might work, using both ends to strike out. I shifted to a one-handed grip and spun the whole thing lightly, and Gaav's eyebrows rose. 

"Looks like you've got some muscle memory hiding in there somewhere, although damned if I know how. That'll make things a little easier, but you'll need to drill until you actually _understand_ what you're doing, or you might end up killing someone you don't mean to." 

I scowled, but I knew he was right. Instead of saying anything, I found the indentations in the handle and used them to separate the blades again. I stuck the shorter blade through my belt, which sagged under the weight—it wasn't a proper swordbelt, so I was going to have to get one of those, or some kind of harness, like the over-the-shoulder one Gaav wore. Then I drew the longer blade, which turned out to be made of some oddly greenish metal. 

"There are spells on this," I said—I could feel them, pulsing warmly against the palm of my hand, awake and curious now. 

Gaav nodded. "Standard crap mostly, for sharpness and for affecting the astral. The metal's also rustproof and self-cleaning, for whatever that's worth. And there's a spell of ownership—now that you've drawn that one, they'll always come back to you." 

_Nice._ I'd grown up in a shop that sold weapons, albeit as a sideline, so I knew what it would have cost to buy a weapon with the level of enchantment Gaav had described as "standard crap". And anything carrying a spell of ownership was _really_ rare. 

"I don't know what happened to your old ones," the Mazoku added, "but they had a bit of my power in them and I can't sense them anywhere, so I expect they were destroyed somehow while I wasn't around. Try not to lose these." 

I stopped dead with the longer sword half-sheathed in my hands, because it had suddenly occurred to me that he was giving me another _present_ , and he was going to combine it with a favour if he taught me how to use the blades. And I didn't want to owe him anything. But at the same time, it felt wrong to be pissed off at him for being nice to me. Filia would have had a mace-waving fit if she'd caught me acting that way, and so would Father Teremar (minus the mace). Or maybe not. I wasn't sure that either of them would have considered a Dark Lord deserving of common courtesy. Filia certainly didn't treat _Xellos_ with any courtesy, and he was only one step down from Gaav in the Mazoku hierarchy, as I understood it. 

I shook my head and pushed the blade the rest of the way into the scabbard, then tried to think of something to do with it that wouldn't make my belt sag down to my ankles. 

"Like this, little dragon." Big, warm hand on my shoulder; scratchy, warm power guiding mine to form a pocket in space. " _Kieter Selerat._ It's pretty much the same thing as you do with your clothes when you change shape, except that you don't have to worry quite so hard about where these are going to reappear." 

I memorized the Power Words and the feel of the spell, and put the blades inside my new space-twist, but I also found myself snapping, "Why the hell do you have to be so _nice_?" 

"'Cause I want to be." Gaav smirked, but his eyes looked serious to me. "Do I need another reason?" 

I glared at him. "Fuck you." It was the only thing I could find to say. 

Too bad it made him start to laugh.


	7. Chapter 6

I was more than ready to get away from all ships of any sort by the time we sailed into the harbour at Port Tishan, a city of raw adobe that hadn't even existed when I'd been hatched. While the Mazoku Barrier had been up, Elmekia had been wholly landlocked, but once the rest of the world became available to them, they'd claimed a slice of the Desert of Destruction to the south of their borders and set up a port at the best-sheltered harbour, supplying fresh water with a massive array of permanent Aqua Create spells and building a caravan road that led back north to the rest of the country. The rest of the Elmekian province of Tishan was still uninhabited, unimproved desert, though. 

Anyway, I'd spent the past week-and-a-half aboard the former ghost ship, being put to work whenever the sailors needed an extra hand. When we'd discovered that the _Aleare_ was salvageable, barely, I'd thought it was a good thing. It wasn't until after the sailors had spent a couple of days stealing boards from the interiors of both ships, nailing them over the hole in the side of the stricken merchantman, and caulking the mess with kegs of tar found on the ghost ship, that someone realized that given the number of sailors who had been pulled down by the zombies, we didn't really have enough crew for both ships. At the same time, no one wanted to abandon either of them. So they pressed Gaav and I into service. 

The Dark Lord took it better than I'd expected. He even put up with being yelled at by the ship's officers without doing much more than roll his eyes. Of course, I was the only other person who knew that if he'd really gotten pissed off, he could have blown both ships up in a fit of pique. 

We had to anchor both ships well away from the docks to wait for the customs officials. It took a while. In fact, as far as I could tell, the whole customs operation ground to a screeching halt the moment we appeared in the harbour and took a couple of hours to straighten itself out enough to start sending out boats again. In the meanwhile, I paced the deck of the ghost ship and brooded. And tried to resist the temptation to kick Gaav, who was sitting with his eyes shut and his back propped against the railing on the seaward side of the deck. I was pretty sure he wasn't really asleep, though, and if I did kick him I'd probably get dumped on my ass. Again. 

He'd held to his promise to teach me how to use the paired blades he'd given me. So far, that had involved a lot of being dumped on my ass, a lot of criticism, and the odd compliment that pissed me off more than being dumped on my ass because his words were the first thing in a while that actually made me feel good about myself. I actually preferred it when he yelled at me for hesitating in mid-movement because I wasn't sure what came next. I knew how to deal with being yelled at. But his kindness got deep down inside of me somehow, in a way that no one else's ever did. And it scared me, and being scared pissed me off too. 

Anger hurts less than fear or grief or guilt. It had been my refuge ever since I'd hatched. Anger . . . and self-hate, because if I embraced the guilt, then it hurt less. Fighting it just made it scream at me that I was wrong wrong WRONG, that a weak failure like me didn't deserve anything better than this, and in the end only my talons seemed able to muffle the voice inside my brain and make me able to function again. 

Gaav could upset the fragile equilibrium inside of me with a handful of words that spoke directly to my spirit. Without even trying. And I wanted to hate him for it. But somehow, I couldn't. Whenever I tried, it was as though my very soul twisted, and the pain made me want to cry like a hatchling. I couldn't wait until we got rid of this stupid bond and it stopped messing me up inside. 

Finally the customs boats—two of them—sculled out across the waters towards the _Aleara_ and the nameless ghost ship, giving me something to think about other than the crap sloshing around inside my brain. The one aiming for the ghost ship had someone with a grey uniform in it. A familiar grey uniform, actually. _Great, so we managed to capture a zombie Elemekian navy ship._ I wasn't sure whether that was trouble or not. 

Gaav opened his eyes as the first of the new arrivals reached the top of the rope ladder and clambered over the railing. His hands shifted on his huge sword, currently lying across his lap, but he made no move to get up. I went over to stand beside him, planting my elbows on the railing. 

"They're about as nervous as any humans I've ever seen," he rumbled, glancing up at me. 

"Do you think they know which ship this is?" We hadn't been able to figure that out ourselves. The ship's log, when we'd found it, had had an ink bottle upended onto it, thoroughly soaking the pages and then allowing them to dry into a sort of lump of black-brown paper pulp. Illegible, in other words, and most of the letters painted across the stern were too faded to make out except for the final "n"—or was it part of an "m" or an "h"? 

"Well, they don't taste confused, so I wouldn't be surprised if they did. They'll probably want to talk to us." 

"Shit," I muttered. 

"You could leave before they get here," the Mazoku said, voice deceptively mild. "After all, it isn't like they can stop you." 

I didn't really want to stick around . . . but I knew what Filia would have said, or Father Teremar. "The men on this ship would have had families and friends. They deserve to know what happened, and we're the only ones who heard what the captain said. I can tell them, though. You don't have to stay." 

Gaav snorted. "You think they—or you—could make me do anything I don't want to? I want the name of the ship, and some information on its route if I can squeeze it out of them. That won't tell us exactly where they picked up our green-haired mystery man and his fucking jar, but it's better than searching blindly up and down the coast." 

"Fine. You can do the talking, then." 

"I was going to. Brace yourself, little dragon, because here they come." 

"Who the hell are you calling little?" I growled, and the Mazoku bastard laughed as we watched the customs party file up from below, in company with the ship's temporary captain—our old friend Greenwave. 

Gaav rose smoothly to his feet as they approached and hung his sword back in its place across his back. He hooked his thumbs in the pockets of his ridiculous, ugly coat. It managed to make him look both casual and intimidating, so much so that the approaching group came to a halt a half-step further away than I felt was normal. 

The naval officer—he didn't have nearly as much gold braid and crap on his uniform as the zombie captain we'd killed, so he was probably a lieutenant or something—glared up at the Dark Lord. I got the feeling he was scared, and pissed off because he was scared. I could relate. 

"You are Gavin, er . . ." 

"Just Gavin," Gaav replied, with his usual smirk. 

"Very well. And Val Ul Copt," the officer added, nodding in my direction. 

I shrugged. "Yeah, so?" 

"You were the first people to board the _Raven_." 

Gaav raised a shaggy eyebrow. "If that's what this tub is called." 

"Please don't make this difficult." 

"You want to speed things up? Okay, fine. I want to know where this ship was headed before it got in trouble, 'cause something it came into contact with happens to be of interest to me. Tell me that, and I'll tell you what you want to know." 

The blunt offer of exchange caught me by surprise. I'd expected Gaav to . . . I don't know . . . break the navy guy's head open and stir his brains around with his finger until he found the bit containing the information he wanted? I sure as hell hadn't thought he'd be this honest and straightforward. It made me respect him a bit, even though I didn't want to. 

Lieutenant Whatzis frowned. "I . . ." Abruptly, he turned to me. "What about you? Do you want a bribe too?" 

I shrugged again, and drawled, "Well, I don't know. I kind of want to know about the same thing he does. And anyway, I was just following him around and guarding his back, in the interest of getting everyone out of that mess in one piece." 

I didn't think I'd ever seen anyone look so sour. "You two aren't giving me a choice, are you?" 

Gaav's smirk widened. "That's the idea. So, are you going to pay up, or do you want to spend the next couple of hours playing Twenty Questions and probably asking all the wrong ones?" 

The lieutenant scowled. "Well, it's no secret, I suppose. The _Raven_ was returning here from the Coastal States Alliance. No one expected she'd turn up so far south, or we would have found her before you." 

"And done what? Unless you've gone on a surplus warship buying spree in the past twenty years or so, the _Raven_ 's probably the biggest thing you've got. Never mind that, it was a fucking rhetorical question," Gaav added when the naval officer drew breath to answer. "Okay, so we were four days out of Copper Cove on Dallangys Island when we ran into a fog bank . . ." 

Again, the Dark Lord surprised me by telling almost everything straight, right down to the zombie dog. He did edit the conversation about the jar a bit, but he only changed what _he'd_ said, not what the zombie captain said. He didn't seem to want anyone to know that he'd heard of that Zoamelwhatzis thing before. I wasn't sure why he thought it mattered, but I didn't complain, either. 

"'Zoamelgustar'," the lieutenant repeated when he was done. "I think that's the patron . . . something . . . of one of the little city-states in the Coastal Alliance. Thank you, you've been a big help." 

"So have you," I said, when Gaav didn't seem to have anything to add. "See you." I waited until they were out of earshot before adding to my Mazoku companion, "So now what?" 

The Dark Lord shrugged. "We ask around to see if anyone's seen a green-haired guy carrying a fucking ugly jar. If no one here knows anything, we're going to have to find another fucking boat and head up the coast, I guess, unless they've put a road in since the last time I was here." 

"I've had enough boats to last me a lifetime," I grumbled. 

"So have I, little dragon, but if the _Raven_ picked up that man and his jar sailing along the coastline, we're not going to find them by going north into Elmekia." 

"Stop _calling_ me that," I snapped. 

Gaav smirked. "Nah, I don't think so. I need to keep you pissed off to protect you from yourself, and that's a cheap and easy way." 

I growled at him, but the damned smirk stayed firmly in place. "I'm getting off this tub. Find me tonight if you like. Until then, I don't want to see your face." 

"Fine. Don't do anything I wouldn't." 

Which meant burning the town to the ground and killing everyone in it was fine, but taking my talons to my own flesh wasn't, right. "Fuck off," I growled, and muttered the teleportation spell I'd learned from Filia years ago. If it hadn't been limited to line-of-sight, I could probably have teleported myself straight to Seyruun City and not had to spend half a month on a boat with a conceited Mazoku Dark Lord in the first place. 

Come to think of it, why hadn't that red-headed bastard teleported us straight to our destination himself? It had to be within his power, and I wasn't sure I believed that crap about him wanting to keep a low profile. 

"Shit," I said out loud to the empty air. "And what the hell are you staring at?" I added to a grizzled old sailor who was perched on a stack of lumber nearby, smoking his pipe. He muttered something and looked away, and I stalked off along the docks. _Shopping first,_ I decided. Right now, I owned the clothes I stood up in, the weapons Gaav had given me, and pretty much nothing else except the coins left over from buying passage on the _Aleare_. 

Rather than ask anyone for directions, I just found the widest, most populated street and headed up it. Port cities always had a market near the harbour, where sailors bought last-minute pairs of socks and sold off whatever trinkets they'd picked up in foreign parts so that they could afford to get drunk, and it was always well-populated. Ten minutes later, I was browsing through the contents of a couple of dozen stalls and just as many small collections of random junk laid out on blankets. I wanted a change of clothes and a minimal set of travelling gear—a blanket of my own, a canteen, a pan or pot, and a couple of days' worth of preserved food. With those things, I wouldn't be quite so reliant on Gaav. Although I did have to keep enough money back to potentially pay for a boat further up the coast, which meant I was going to have to do some pretty sharp haggling. Or find a way to earn a bit more cash. 

" _WHAT DO YOU MEAN, 'NO CREDIT'?!_ " 

The shrill scream blasted my eardrums, and I saw several people nearby fall over bleeding from various orifices. 

"I mean exactly what I said, ma'am. No. Credit. And I don't do barter, either. So if you want to buy something, you're going to have to pass over some actual coins." The voice that spoke into the sudden silence was also feminine, a warm, amused alto. 

" _Do you KNOW who I AM?_ " 

"A foreigner," came the amused reply. "Which means that if I give you credit, I'll probably never collect." 

"Martina . . ." Male voice this time, and long-suffering. Looking around, it was easy enough to find the source of the voices: they were the only people other than me who hadn't fled the market or ducked behind something. The man had long salt-and-pepper hair poking out from under the shabbiest hat I had ever seen, and the woman beside him was wearing black leather. A very small amount of black leather. Should someone in her forties really be dressed that way in public? Although she did have a remarkably good figure for her age. They were facing a matronly shopkeeper over a large pile of knitted socks. 

"Zangy, dear, we need that money to enlarge the temple of the Holy Zoamelgustar . . ." The woman in the bondage gear looked at her male companion with teary eyes. 

Wait a minute. Zoamelgustar, bondage gear, and hair in curly mint-green ringlets . . . That sounded an awful lot like the woman Gaav had described to the zombie captain of the _Raven_. Which meant that they might have something to do with all of this. Well, unless it turned out that "Martina" was using hair dye. I wished Gaav had mentioned the woman's name. 

"We brought this money with us to spend, remember?" "Zangy" said. "Just like old times, when no one would give us credit because they knew we were broke from rebuilding the palace . . ." 

Martina pouted. "I hated the old days. No money, and I had to work all the time, and . . . Lina . . ." She sniffled and buried her face in the shoulder of "Zangy"'s . . . poncho? Anyway, it was an awkwardly-draped garment that looked just as disreputable as the hat. "We need to find Zoey soon!" Or at least, I think that was what she said. It was difficult to make out when she was talking into someone else's shoulder nearly twenty feet away. 

"We will," her . . . boyfriend? Husband? . . . said, patting her back comfortingly. 

The merchant cleared her throat. "That's really nice and all, but if you want those socks, it's still three copper a pair." 

"Zangy" rummaged through his pockets and slapped some money down on the counter, then pocketed two pairs of socks. Martina was still clinging to him, so his effort to stride off down the row of stalls turned into more of a crablike sidle. Fortunately, there was a fountain surrounded by a low bench at the middle of the market area, and he managed to guide her over there and sit down. 

I hesitated for several moments—well, okay, I dithered, but anyone who says that in public is going to find themselves eating a fist—before heading for the fountain as well. I mean, I didn't know anything about that Zoawhatsis thing except what had been in Gaav's vague description, and it might end up being important. So I felt I should increase our chances of finding that jar quickly by asking questions of anyone who might know something. Even if it was a crazy-looking middle-aged woman in bondage gear. 

Beside the fountain, I hesitated again, feeling very much like an idiot. _Oh, hell . . . here goes nothing._ I cleared my throat. "Excuse me?" 

"Zangy" looked up. "Yes?" 

"I was wondering what you could tell me about Zoamelgustar . . ." 

Suddenly I found myself staring into a pair of starry eyes. "Really?!" Martina squealed, all signs of depression gone. "We don't get many new converts these days! Isn't that so, Lord Zoamelgustar?" Then she struck an odd pose and said, "That's right, Queen Martina!" in a voice an octave deeper than her normal one. "Zangy" hid his face in his hand. 

"Actually, I'm not sure I'm interested in . . . converting," I said. "It's just that I heard the name in an unusual context recently, and when I heard you mention it, I—" 

"You were eavesdropping on us?" "Zangy" interrupted sharply. His hand flew to the hilt of the sword that had been half-hidden by his shabby poncho. "I get it now! You're from that bandit gang, aren't you?" He detached Martina from the front of his shirt and pushed her gently off onto the bench. 

"I have no idea what you're talking about," I said, taking a half-step back. I wasn't sure how he'd gotten from 'Zoamelgustar' to 'bandits!' either, and I wasn't sure it was safe to ask. Fight? Run? 

Before I could make up my mind, "Zangy" took me by surprise, slashing at me _as_ he drew his sword. I swore and twisted away from the attack, discovering in the process that he was pretty damned fast for a forty-something human. "Fight" it was, then, and I muttered the spell that opened the space twist and grabbed the longer of my two blades. Block-block-block- _shit_! That one had been a feint, and I wasn't going to be able to get my weapon back over in time to keep him from trimming my ear— 

_Clang!_

The crazy man's sword bounced off another much wider blade, and "Zangy" fell back a couple of steps. 

"Fuck, I can't leave you alone for ten minutes without you getting into trouble," said a familiar deep voice. 

"And I didn't ask for your help!" I snarled at Gaav.


	8. Chapter 7

"You've got it anyway," the Dark Lord said. He rounded out the remark by smirking and lifting his sword to prop it against his shoulder. 

"Wait! Wait a moment here!" Martina just about yelled it. "I know you! You tried to kill us!" And she pointed straight at Gaav. 

"Zangy" glared up at the larger man and raised his sword. "You attacked my wife?!" Well, at least now I knew they were married. 

Gaav snorted. "If she's who I think she is, she got in the way while I was having an argument with Lina fucking Inverse, and just about ended up as collateral damage. I wasn't after her. But if you want to fight anyway, I'm good with that." 

"Oh," the swordsman said. "Lina. That explains everything." He swept his sword back into its scabbard. "I wouldn't mind fighting you either, but I don't think the middle of a public street's a good place. Maybe we can find somewhere out of the way later on and spar for a couple of rounds." And, so softly I didn't think I was supposed to be able to hear, "I hate being a diplomatic representative of Zoana. In the old days I would just have gone for it . . ." 

"Lina," muttered Martina. "Lord Zoamelgustar, is she still around? After what she did to our country? Could your curse have failed?" Her voice rose gradually as she asked the questions, and she clasped her hands together, staring skyward through teary eyes as though she really did expect an answer. 

"Zangy" grimaced. "Sorry about my wife. She . . . does this sometimes." 

"This Zoamelgustar shit's been coming up a little too often lately," Gaav said, returning his sword to its place at his back. I returned the blade I was still holding to its own place in a twist of nowhere, feeling as much annoyed as relieved, and wishing I'd been able to turn the combat into a fist-fight. That might have been fun. But being interrupted like that meant that my blood was still running hot. I felt like I had to have steam rising from my ears. 

"Your friend said something about that," "Zangy" said. "It's a long shot, but I don't suppose you ran into a young man with hair the colour of Martina's and a hat like mine?" 

Gaav's eyes narrowed. "We didn't see him, but I think we crossed his trail. Sounds like we'd better have a talk." 

Which is how we ended up in a bar in Port Tishan, sitting across the table from a woman who looked like she worked in a fetish brothel and a guy who apparently never took his hat off. 

"I'm Zangulus, by the way," the swordsman told us. Well, it was better than "Zangy", anyway. "And this is my wife, Martina." 

"Martina Zoana Mel Navratilova," she corrected, with an edged smile. "Not that I'd expect a pair of commoners to recognize such an august name—ohohoho!" She covered her mouth with one hand as she laughed. 

"Gavin," Gaav said easily. Martina gave him a Look, as though she knew that wasn't quite right but wasn't sure what _was_ right, either. "And this is Val." 

I nodded to Zangulus—to hell with Martina, she'd been getting on my nerves from the moment I'd laid eyes on her. 

"We're looking for our son," the swordsman said, and then the conversation paused as the barmaid brought over three mugs of beer and a glass of wine and set them on the table. We all picked up our drinking vessels and took ritual sips. 

Martina immediately spat hers out again, spraying the barmaid, who gave her a nasty look and pulled out a handkerchief to sponge herself off. "You call this _wine_? It's more like paint thinner!" 

Zangulus took her glass and sipped from it. "Definitely not Zephilian, but I've had worse. So have you, in the old days." 

"To hell with the old days," Martina said, but she also took her wineglass back. 

"Sorry about this," Zangulus said to the barmaid, pressing a couple of coppers into her hand. The woman rolled her eyes, but she also went away. 

"The guy you're looking for, with the green hair and the hat—that's your son?" I just wanted to get the conversation back on track before I had to spend too long drinking mediocre beer. 

Zangulus nodded. "His name is Zoanel. If you've seen him, we need to know." 

"Like I said, it's more that we ran across his trail," Gaav said. He took a gulp of his beer, then gave the mug an offended look. "On our way here, we ended up tangling with a zombie ship. The captain, when we found him, said a lot of shit about his ship being under 'the curse of Zoamelgustar'. I thought at first that meant he'd run into you—" He gestured vaguely at Martina. "—but when I asked, he told me it was a young man with green hair, wearing a hat. Of course, he was a zombie and his brain was turning to sludge, but if it's a coincidence, it's a pretty fucking big one." 

Martina looked horrified. "No, that can't have been Zoanel! A zombie ship . . . ugh. The Lord Zoamelgustar wouldn't have created anything that disgusting." 

"Got to admit, it seems pretty fishy," Zangulus said. "Still, it's the only lead we've had since we got to Elmekia. And if you were trying to kidnap us or something, you'd have come up with a better story." 

"Thanks," I drawled. "Anyway, it wasn't that Zoamelgustar thing that zombified the ship, although your son may think it was." 

I think Zangulus raised his eyebrows, but between the bar's crappy lighting and that hat of his, it was hard to tell. "Then what was it?" 

"You guys remember Hellmaster?" Gaav scowled as he spoke the name. 

Martina shuddered. Zangulus winced. 

"I don't think we'll ever forget," the swordsman said, and Martina nodded. "But he's dead. Lina killed him." 

"Well, it looks like she missed a piece," Gaav said. "I don't know if it's a full subordinate Mazoku or just a chunk of power with a bad temper, but your son's apparently got it. In a fucking ugly jar. And there are other Mazoku looking for it." 

Martina went white. "Zangy, we have to find him! Quickly! I'm going to send a message . . . home, and get them to send some men." 

"I thought we were trying to keep a low profile," her husband said. 

"I don't care about that diplomatic garbage anymore! Our son's life is at stake!" 

Gaav snorted. "Piss off Elmekia and they'll squish something as small as Zoana in one minute flat. Unless Seyruun's beefed up its army a lot since I was last in this area, there isn't anyone who could stop them." Wait a minute, Zoana was a country? Then I suddenly realized who we had to be sitting with. _That_ Zangulus, the one who had been obsessed with beating Gourry Gabriev in a sword fight. And _that_ Martina, who had destroyed her own country's capital with a malfunctioning golem and blamed it on Lina Inverse . . . or so Lina claimed. You'd think I would have clued in before. It wasn't like "Zangulus" was a common name. "Not to mention, any of your soldiers who get caught in the crossfire are going to end up as a couple of pinches of cinders." 

"You sound like you care," I said, tilting my head in his direction. 

The Dark Lord shrugged. "I don't like cannon fodder getting in my way. It just makes things more difficult." 

"You're going after him?" Martina asked. 

"We're going after the fucking jar full of Mazoku. What happens to your son depends on whether or not he has the sense not to cross me." 

"Better rethink that fast," Zangulus said as he half-rose from the table, his hand on his sword. 

Gaav chuckled. "You think you can even put a scratch on me with a second-rate magic sword like that? The spell on it's cute, I admit, but it's inferior even to the so-called Sword of Light. Which couldn't harm me either. Stop having delusions of being Lina Inverse." And he let his eyes flash red. Just for a second, but there was no way anyone watching him was going to mistake it. 

Zangulus jerked. "Who are you really?" 

"He's a Mazoku, Zangy. One of the really strong ones. The Demon Dragon King." Martina sounded sober and serious for once. 

The swordsman went slightly pale, and he sat down again. "Are you a Mazoku too?" he asked me abruptly, and I glared at him. 

"Like hell! I'm a dragon. As for why I'm travelling with the Embodiment of All Evil here, let's just say that I'm stuck with him and this business with Hellmaster in a jar interrupted my plans for getting unstuck." 

"And you just want this jar?" Zangulus asked. 

"We want to get rid of the jar," Gaav corrected him. "Val to make sure it's never used again, me to get back at Phibby for killing me. That's it. No complicated plans this time." 

"Then we're coming with you too." Martina's tone left no room for argument. 

"I'm not sure that's a good idea," her husband said. 

"If we can get the jar away from Zoanel without having to fight him, that makes everything easier, doesn't it?" Martina was looking at Gaav, ignoring her husband. 

The Dark Lord shrugged. "If you don't get in the way. If you do, I won't hesitate to get rid of you. Val's the only one here whose survival I give a damn about, other than myself." 

I turned my glare on him. "So if I tell you _I_ want them alive, will you put a little more effort into keeping them that way?" 

There was that damned chuckle of his again, that made me feel warm even though I hated it, and him. "Ballsy little dragon. A little more effort, yes. But I won't trade an outsider's life for mine or yours. Got it?" 

His eyes, when I met them, were pleased. Even . . . proud of me. Ugh. Why did that have to make me feel so good? Like I'd done something right and worthwhile by arguing with him—I was pretty damned sure it wasn't the position I'd taken that was making him happy. 

I hated it. I hated the way he made me feel warm and safe. Because getting feelings like that from _him_ was wrong. It meant . . . that I was everything I'd been brought up to think of as evil. I didn't want that. I couldn't handle that. 

Why did it have to be like this? 

I took a deep gulp of my beer, trying to distract myself. It wasn't great, but I'd had much worse while I was working the docks. It wasn't unusual for the longshoremen to treat one another to a few rounds at the end of the day, but not all of them were willing to shell out for _good_ beer. 

Gaav was still looking at me. I offered him a shrug. 

"Most people aren't altruistic enough to give up their own lives for someone else's," I said. "All I ask is that you don't kill casually." 

"You think I do?" His eyes had gone cool again, his head slightly tilted. 

"I don't know, damnit! I don't know you that well. On the one hand, you didn't mulch Zangulus here either of the times he drew on you, and I know you could have. On the other hand, you sure stand aside casually enough when someone's about to get killed." But as he'd pointed out to me a while ago, I didn't exactly go out of my way to save everyone I met, either. And the contradiction was twisting inside me like a bundle of knives. _Humans die. All the time._ They shouldn't have to, and yet there was no way to stop it from happening. 

Under the table, a big hand squeezed my knee. "Stop that." Somehow, I knew I was the only one who'd heard the words. "Everyone'll start thinking you have hero disease." 

_Meaning?_ I tried to ask him without actually saying anything. 

"The compulsive desire to save everyone and his fucking pet ferret. Given your history, I understand why, but it doesn't really suit you." His hand was still there on my knee, like he might have rested it on a dog's head, if there had been a dog somewhere in the world that was willing to have anything to do with him. I fought down an urge to growl and bare my teeth. An urge stemming from emotions which he probably found tasty. _Fuck you, Gaav._

"I guess that's it for now," Zangulus said. "Well, except that I'm not quite sure where we need to go next." 

"Up the coast," Gaav said aloud. "We'll need to find a ship. Got any ideas?" 

It was all I could do not to groan aloud. Of course, another damned ship. Even though I never wanted to see another ship. Well, we'd known there was no other way from the moment we'd talked to that Elmekian officer on board the _Raven_. 

"There's an inn called the Broken Oar, down by the harbour, that a lot of the merchant captains like to drink at," Zangulus said. "As for specific ships, I haven't got a clue. We came up on one of the really big passenger liners, but when you're on one of those, you don't make unscheduled stops." Which we might have to do—that went without saying. 

Gaav drained his mug and set it down with a thump. "Fine, looks like that's where we're headed next. Is there an easy way we can get word to you?" 

"We're staying at the Crown Jewels." 

"Right." The Dark Lord pushed his chair back. "Coming, little dragon?" 

"I am _not_ little," I growled. 

We found the Broken Oar down at one end of the harbour, built up against the stone wall of a warehouse. It was completely different from the nondescript and mostly empty bar we'd been drinking at with Zangulus and Martina, and I don't mean just because it had an upper storey and a "rooms for rent" sign out front. At the Broken Oar, the first thing you noticed when you walked in the door was the gimmicky decor. Sailcloth draperies separating the tables, paintings of tropical islands on the walls, that kind of crap. They even had a ship's wheel standing all alone in an open space at the middle of the room. 

The second thing you noticed was that all the conversations had just died down and everyone at the well-populated tables was turning to stare at you. Or at least at the Dark Lord in front of you, who was ignoring them totally as he headed for the bar. I shoved my hands in my pockets and did my best to look casual as I followed him, but there was no way I could manage to look as indifferent as he did . . . because his indifference wasn't a pose. He honestly didn't care. 

The bartender was polishing glasses. Which might have looked a little less odd if he hadn't been dressed like a pirate from a children's play, complete with a fake eyepatch made of black gauze that he could probably see through perfectly well. Why the hell did the local merchant captains come to a tacky theme bar to drink? Well, there was no accounting for taste, I guess. At least the stock of bottles behind the bar looked extensive. 

The bartender tapped the head of the stuffed parrot riding on his shoulder, and damned if it didn't open its beak and squawk, "What'll it be, boys? _Awk!_ " There had to be some kind of animation spell on it. 

Gaav's eyebrows rose. "You've got to be fucking kidding me." 

"Not my idea, mate, but the owners like it when I use it," the bartender said. "You gonna order something?" 

"Beer. Silestan, if you've got it." 

"Sure. What about your friend?" 

"I'll pick up his tab." Gaav spoke before I could say anything. 

I smirked. "Well, if you're going to give me a chance to bankrupt you, I won't object." I considered the shelves of bottles, and the prices neatly painted on a board on a wall. "That's Lishto plum brandy, isn't it? Give me the bottle." I'd only had the stuff once, but I remembered it as being as smooth as a porcelain-coated cannonball. A whole bottle should be enough to get even a dragon drunk . . . and then maybe I'd be able to forget about all this crap for an hour or two. 

The bartender looked at Gaav, who slapped a silver piece down on the bartop, and said, "Go ahead—he holds his liquor better than he looks like he does." 

"Thanks," I said sarcastically. 

The bartender drew Gaav's beer from one of the racked kegs at the end of the bar. It looked like tar with foam on top, but the Dark Lord didn't seem bothered by that. Instead, he picked up the mug and took a swallow, then sighed and wiped off his foam moustache with the back of his hand. 

"Fuck, that's good. The last place only had one kind of beer, and it was pretty crappy." 

"A lot of the smaller bars just buy whatever surplus comes through the docks," the bartender said, setting down my bottle and a shot glass. "Just a sec, mate, and I'll get a corkscrew." 

"Don't bother." I'd learned the trick to pulling corks with my talons a couple of years ago. First, unwrap the wire holding the foil in place and lift the thin layer of tin away, then sprout a single talon from a forefinger and slide it in, curling it enough to get a grip on the cork for a vertical pull but not enough to shred it. Then a steady, straight pull and it would pop right out. 

The bartender raised his eyebrows at me as I poured myself a glass. "So, where you fellows looking for a ship to?" 

"How do you know we're here looking for a ship?" I countered. 

His shrug almost sent that stupid stuffed parrot off onto the floor. "We only get three kinds of people here. Well, four, but the ones who've got the wrong place usually get out again right away. The only customers who come here _on purpose_ are ship's officers, sailors looking to sign on, or people looking for passage. And neither of you looks like you've spent much time on the water, except maybe as pirates or marines." 

Gaav chuckled, while I was busy being offended. Apparently the hours I'd put in on fishing boats didn't show. "Good eye. We're for the Coastal States." 

"Hmm. Not a good time of year for that—the winds are against you. Plus, there've been some pirates working part of the coast. The _Bergen_ 's hitting the Coastal States eventually, but she's swinging south for the islands first, so you're looking at a couple of months at least." 

"Nothing else?" the Dark Lord asked. "We're in a bit of a hurry." 

"Weeeell, if you're really desperate, there's the _Miss Mermaid_. Captain's back at that table in the corner, with their quartermaster." The bartender nodded towards the back of the building, pointing out a table occupied by . . . two fishmen. 

Oh, fuck, that was just great. 

I tossed back my brandy and poured another one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, Lina Inverse's presence in an anecdote explains everything. And then some. ::nodnod::


	9. Chapter 8

The only thing worse than sailing on a fishman ship, I soon discovered, was sailing on a fishman ship while I had a hangover. 

It wasn't that the crew of the _Miss Mermaid_ meant to be inhospitable, but as the captain put it, their ship just wasn't set up for land-dwellers. For starters, there were no cabins, or even a common bunk area for the crew—the fishmen preferred to drop over the side after they anchored for the night, and sleep in the ocean. That was useful for them, since it meant they could dedicate every inch of space they didn't need for shipboard operations to holding cargo, but it was a pain for us. Especially since the news that there was going to be very little privacy didn't stop Martina from coming along. 

There was no latrine, either. The fishmen did their business down in the water too. The rest of us got to use a bucket, hidden as best we could manage with stacked cargo. 

And just to round things off, we had to bring our own food and fresh water, or eat seaweed and drink the salt ocean water the fishmen had shat in. Which meant that we had to pay for a chunk of cargo space just to make sure we could eat, and I had to cast a lot of Aqua Creates. 

By the time I heard about that part, I was ready to fly down the coast rather than put up with any more crap, but I knew there was a possibility we might miss something from the air. And someone would end up having to carry Martina, and I had a feeling it wasn't going to be Gaav. 

The Dark Lord spent a lot of the trip sitting on a pile of crates with his scabbarded sword propped against his shoulder, staring at the coastline as it ambled past. As far as I could tell, he wasn't doing anything, which annoyed me more than it should have when the rest of us weren't doing much either. 

Me? I spent a lot of my time exercising, because I knew I needed to burn off my anger. Hoist crates or do pushups or work with my weapons until I was getting limp, then dump a bucket of seawater over my head, fishman crap and all, and flop down on the deck for half an hour until I was ready for another round. Sometimes Gaav would give me what we both called "lessons", and Zangulus often pitched in too—either to get away from Martina or because he genuinely loved to fight. It was a good thing, too, because what I really needed was a punching bag to knock around while I got a handle on my reflexes and Gaav explained to me what the hell I was doing. Zangulus filled that role admirably, and didn't mind taking bruises and cuts because of it. 

We were five days out of port, and I was drilling with the two-separate-blades form of my weapon, when Gaav suddenly stiffened and rose from his pile of crates. 

"Val." 

I rolled my eyes. "Look, I know that swing wasn't quite—" 

"It isn't that. There's a group of humans on shore. I want you to check it out." 

"Me? Why the hell should I do your work?" 

He raised a bushy eyebrow. "'Cause you're the one going stir-crazy here. Now get that dragon ass of yours moving." 

I spat on the deck at his feet, which he seemed to find funny. I still didn't understand his sense of humour. Really, I was hoping that I never would. 

" _Ray Wing!_ " I snapped, and lifted off the deck. I could have flown over there under my own power, but using the spell had an advantage: the wall of the Ray Wing bubble acted as a shield against arrows, bullets, and minor magics like Wind Brid. And I didn't know what I was going to find on shore. Maybe nothing. Maybe a shipwreck. Maybe those pirates the bartender at the Broken Oar had mentioned. 

Maybe something worse. I mean, I was travelling with a _Dark Lord_. That had kind of increased the range of possibilities for "worse". Ugh. 

The shoreline here was composed of the same kind of low cliffs and scrubby low hills we'd been seeing since we left port. Or at least, that's what I thought until I got a lot higher up. 

You couldn't see the cove from the ocean because the cliffs were a little higher there, and the only entrance was slanted so that it was almost parallel to the rockface. Actually, I wouldn't have been surprised to find out that someone had blasted that entrance on purpose, opening what had been an enclosed salt water lagoon up to the sea. 

It was a nice little hidey-hole, and someone had taken advantage of that. There were two slim ships with oversized sails moored there, and a ramshackle stone fort-slash-residential-complex was built up against another cliff on the far side. Hell if I knew where they were getting their drinking water, though. Sorcerers capable of casting a _permanent_ Aqua Create were neither common nor cheap, and I doubted these guys would be able to pay the kind of fee a spell like that demanded. Maybe they'd gotten their hands on an enchanted desalinization filter, like some ocean liners used. Unlike an Aqua Create spell, those were portable and could be stolen. 

Yeah, there were people there. A good thirty of them, and those were only the ones that I could see—there had to be more inside that building of theirs. I'd dropped down among the rocks cresting the sea cliff before any of them spotted me (more due to luck than skill, I had to admit), and used a vision-enhancing skill to check them out. All men, as far as I could see. Most of them hadn't shaved in a couple of days. Their clothes were a mishmash of the kind of stuff sailors who were a bit down on their luck wore, mixed with occasional flashy pieces—there was one guy with an embroidered waistcoat in painfully bright orange, for instance—and a lot of flashy jewelry. And they were all armed with something, mostly swords or axes. 

To my mind, that all added up to one thing: pirates. 

The question was, were Zoanel and the jar there? Gaav should have noticed the jar, shouldn't he? He'd clearly noticed that there were humans here. But maybe the jar had some way of hiding itself. How could I know? _Gaav_ might not even know. 

I was about to crawl back to the seaside cliff edge and head back to the _Miss Mermaid_ from there when there was a bit of a commotion near the building. Someone came running out with a couple of other people chasing him. The blur of motion made it difficult to pick out detail, but it looked to me like the guy in the lead had a brown hat, and was holding it in place with one hand while he ran. 

I settled down to watch again. Zangulus had said that Zoanel wore a hat like his, but if that was our stray young human, why was he being chased? And not looking where he was going, apparently, because one pirate, a little more quick-thinking than the rest, was able to tackle him from the front and bring him down. In the process, the hat went flying, giving me a clear view of hair that was the same precise shade of green as Martina's. Well, that settled it. We'd found our wayward prince, and even if he didn't still have the jar, he should know where it had gone. 

The problem was that it looked like we were going to have to rescue him first. The pirates didn't seem willing to let him roam around at will, judging from the way the two who had been chasing him were now frogmarching him back to the building with large scowls on their faces. And Zoanel deliberately spat at the feet of one man as they walked past. Yeah, that looked like they were all really good friends. 

I headed back to the ship, wondering what was going on. When I explained what I had seen to the others, Gaav and Zangulus looked equally non-plussed. Well, so did Martina, but she was weird anyway, so it was difficult to know what she was thinking. 

"You're right that I don't sense the jar," Gaav rumbled when I was done. "That doesn't mean it isn't there, but that's the way to bet. Which means getting Zoanel out of there in one piece so that we can ask him questions." 

Zangulus looked relieved. "So what's the plan?" 

Gaav smirked and raised a bushy eyebrow. "You sure you trust me to come up with one?" 

The swordsman looked a bit embarrassed. "My plans are never much good. Especially not plans on how to take out thirty-plus people with only four. Even if one of the four's a super-powerful Mazoku and another one's a dragon." 

"If we just wanted everyone dead it would be easy, but picking out one guy and leaving him alive is a lot harder," the Dark Lord admitted. "Especially when we don't know why he's there or what they'll do to him if it looks like they're under attack. We need to spring him first. Then we can wipe the rest of them out any way we want." 

"So what do we do?" I asked, in the hope of speeding things up. 

Gaav's sudden smirk made me wish I hadn't asked. "I figure you and I are going to take up piracy as a hobby for a few days. Go in, find this Zoanel, spring him, and blast the place to ashes on the way out." 

"Why not have Zangulus do it? Zoanel should trust him, right?" I shot a glance at the swordsman, who looked . . . well, his expression was kind of hard to interpret, actually. 

"Now, dear, I'm sure Zoanel isn't still holding a grudge over that," Martina said. 

"Still, I really should have leant him the Howling Sword," her husband said. "The pirates wouldn't have taken him if he'd had it." 

"Or they might have it and him," Gaav said. "In any case, Zangulus is out because Zoanel might see him, react without thinking, and fuck everything up. I don't want to complicate things by messing around with disguises, either. No, you two stay with the boat, and we'll catch up when we're done." 

I scowled, but really, what choice did I have? The faster we tracked down the stupid jar, the faster I'd be rid of Gaav. Hell, I was kind of regretting now that I hadn't told him that he had to wait until the bond between us was broken before he could go after the jar, although the reasons for dealing with the jar first were still there and still good. Yeah, I was feeling sorry for myself. 

"So we just fly over? Isn't that going to look a bit suspicious?" I asked. 

Gaav raised a bushy eyebrow at me. "You know how to row a boat?" 

Which was how I came to be bending my back to a set of oars, half an hour later. The _Miss Mermaid_ hadn't actually had a boat aboard, but Gaav had waved his hand and created one. It was the first time I'd ever seen him really _use_ his powers as a Dark Lord—the other spells he'd used in front of me _could_ have been something a mortal could do, but creating something out of nothing went well beyond that. I couldn't help but look down suspiciously from time to time, wondering when the wooden hull underneath me would vanish and result in my taking an unscheduled swim. Not that it didn't feel solid, but I just couldn't get over the memory of it popping into existence right there in front of me. 

Gaav fended us off the cliffs with a pole as we made the tight, awkward turn into the channel that led to the lagoon. I hoped he'd made up a good excuse for our presence. I'd noticed that he was pretty glib when he wanted to be. 

The hilts of my swords-slash-lance rubbed against my ribs as I worked the oars. I'd pointed out that a prospective pirate turning up without a visible weapon might have looked a little suspicious, and Gaav had shrugged and made a swordbelt for me. I was a little disturbed by the fact it fit perfectly. I did my best to hide it, but I still hated the way he seemed to know everything about me. Maybe it was just because I didn't have an equivalent advantage over him. 

The current was in our favour as we entered the lagoon, even though it shouldn't have been, and I wondered if that was his doing, too. There was a lot more going on in that red-upholstered head than he ever let on. Sometimes I could sense fleeting scraps of it, through the link that I wished didn't exist. 

I was tempted to tell him that the crude warrior chieftain act he put on wasn't fooling me, but I had a feeling he'd just laugh and say I wasn't the one he was intending to fool, or something along those lines. 

Once we were inside the lagoon proper, I shipped the oars, and let the little boat glide along under its own momentum—we'd agreed on that, to make ourselves look less threatening. Gaav sat on the bench at the stern. It was a little too low for him to be comfortable, which made me perversely happy, even though he didn't seem to be bothered. I was facing him from the bench amidships, but neither of us was quite looking at the other. 

Even when we heard a cry from the shore and saw one of those lean, dangerous ships turn slowly away from the wharf to come toward us, we didn't speak. We knew what we needed to do here. That was enough. 

" _What are you two doing here?_ " one of the pirates yelled at us through a megaphone. 

Gaav cupped his hands around his mouth and boomed, " _Looking for water!_ " right back at them. 

Laughs from the ship. " _You picked the wrong place for that!_ " 

" _We'll see!_ " the Dark Lord tossed back. He rose to his feet, balancing easily with the rocking of the boat, drew his sword, and bent his knees slightly. Then he jumped. 

"Son of a bitch!" I snarled as the tiny boat bobbed up and down under me. Left without very much choice—sitting there and waiting wasn't really an option—I jumped too, timing it just so and adding a touch of Levitation so that I popped up to a level a good ten feet above the pirate ship's deck before I started coming back down again. I drew my blades and connected them into lance form in midair, landing beside Gaav and immediately setting myself to cover his back. He might be a pain in the ass, but at least I knew we were on the same side. 

"So you think you're hot stuff, do you?" said one of the pirates. He had something like a chain and grappling hook in his hands, and was swinging the clawed end slowly. 

"Try us," Gaav said, with a smirk. "We heard you were looking for a few good men, so we figured we'd try our luck." 

"In a rowboat? I think you're lying." 

The Dark Lord shrugged. "The only ride we could get up the coast was on a shitty fishman ship. Not even worth capturing, unless you've got a use for bales of seaweed. Fuck, we even had to bring our own rowboat." 

The pirate snorted, but all he said was, "And?" 

"And the two of us can't exactly clean you all out no matter how good we are," I drawled. It was a lie, of course, but they'd never believe the truth anyway. "Besides, do you get many spies who look like us? We kind of stand out in a crowd." 

That got snorts, snickers, and a lot of glances at Gaav from the watching pirates. 

"You talk a good game," the lead pirate admitted. "Question is, can you fight?" 

His grappling hook thing was already in motion by the time he was midway through the question. Gaav and I both sidestepped—in the same direction, even. From the outside, it must have looked like we'd planned it. 

"Nob, flank 'em," the hook-wielder said as he reeled his weapon back in. "Aloysius, in front of me." 

"Aye-aye, Captain." Two other men separated themselves from the group of pirates. Judging from the directions they were moving in, Nob was the short, skinny guy with the blue bandana who had a net in one hand and a dagger in the other, and Aloysius was the bald, extremely broad-shouldered guy with the big axe and what looked like a permanent scowl. Who the hell names their kid "Aloysius", anyway? 

"Watch the net," Gaav said aloud. 

"Yer smarter than ya look," Nob said, shifting his grip on it. 

«You get the big guy,» Gaav told me. «It's the last thing they'll be expecting, and we need this to look good.» 

I gave Aloysius and his axe another look. Okay, so I was stronger than any human, but was the lance Gaav had given me durable enough to take the punishment of his much larger weapon? It had held up against Gaav's sword so far, but the axe was bigger and nastier. 

Aloysius wouldn't be expecting me to be that strong, though. I should be able to fake him out, even with my half-assed skills. 

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the little guy wind up to throw the net at us, and I took three quick steps forward and twisted to the side, leaning a little further over as the axe whistled past my ear. I swung the secondary blade of the lance low at the axeman's ankles, then had to do a full backflip as the grappling hook came my way. It left deep scars on the ship's deck as its owner pulled it back toward himself. 

I couldn't spare time or attention to look at Gaav, but he crossed my line of sight a couple of times. He'd gotten Nob's net wrapped around his left forearm, where it was useless as a weapon, and seemed to be trying to tangle the little guy's dagger in it. His sword thrust at any bit of his opponent he could get a good enough angle on. 

Meanwhile, I danced between the axe and the grappling hook, exercising my dodging skills while I waited for an opening. Pull Aloysius around . . . just a little further, and . . . 

" _Lighting!_ " I snapped, thrusting my hand right in the heavyset man's face. He swore and brought up a hand to shield his eyes from the flash, and I hooked his leg and gave him a hard push on the shoulder, sending him stumbling into the guy with the grapple. 

I grabbed the grapple's chain and yanked it out of its owner's hand as the pirates scrambled for balance. Gaav dumped a rather subdued-looking and bloody-nosed Nob beside them a moment later. He still had the net wrapped around his arm. 

"Anyone else want to try your luck?" the Dark Lord's voice boomed out across the ship's deck. "Next time, we're not going to be so fucking careful about not putting any scratches on you, though." He propped his sword against his shoulder, and smirked. 

"Nah, we're good," said the grappling hook guy as he struggled back to his feet. "I'm Lannis—Captain Lannis, to you." 

"Gavin. And Val." Gaav gestured in my direction. "So—we in? Or do we have to try to get out of here in a fucking rowboat with all of you on our tails?" 

Lannis snorted. "Nah, you're in. Glad to have you. Most of these boys are sailors first—we could use a couple of good fighters. You know any other spells . . . Val, was it?" 

I shrugged. "A couple. Not attack spells. Healing and purification crap." 

"Ah, well, we couldn't expect to find a full Guild sorcerer this far out. Well, boys, let's hear it for our new friends." 

I wasn't sure whether the yells that followed sounded more like cheers or a pack of hounds baying for blood. Even now, I'm still not sure.


	10. Chapter 9

From the outside, the pirate fort looked like three scattered fortified stone buildings, plus a floating wharf made from the timbers of damaged ships. It was an illusion, though. The buildings had been constructed over three entrances to a good-sized cave complex, so they were all joined together. We got the two-bit tour as soon as we arrived—which didn't include their fresh water source or their prison. They didn't trust us that much yet. Then we were invited to set up our living space in any corner that hadn't been claimed by anyone else. 

The caverns had plenty of nooks and crannies. We found a cave that was difficult to get into without Levitation or a rigid ladder—the entrance was ten feet off the ground, through a wall smooth to the point of being slick—and claimed it, even though the sandy floor was barely large enough for Gaav to stretch out on. At least it had a high ceiling. 

Gaav instantly conjured a layer of rough matting to cover the sand, then a layer of finer carpet overtop. Sand-coloured, so unless someone actually entered the cave, it would be hard to tell it was there. He added some rock-coloured cushions and a detection spell in the tunnel outside that would warn us if anyone was nearby, then sat down cross-legged, leaning against the wall with his scabbarded sword propped so that he could encircle it loosely with his arm. 

I sat down opposite him. Now that we'd accomplished Step 1: Get inside the pirate base, there was only so much we could do about Step 2: Find Zoanel while most of the pirates were still awake and moving around, and I was ready for a break. 

"This place is going to be a pain in the ass to search," Gaav said, after a long silence. Was he actually trying to make conversation? 

"We might need to make a map," I agreed. 

Another pause, then, "We should be out there right now talking to those idiots and seeing what we can find out, but I'm fucking tired of trying to weasel answers out of mortals without hurting them. Scum like this aren't really worth the effort involved." 

"I'm mortal," I pointed out. 

"You weren't always." Gaav grimaced in the instant after he said it, as though he hadn't meant to let the words slip out. 

I offered him a lazy grin. "What, are you saying I'm the reincarnation of Ragradia or something?" 

"Or something. You should be glad I value you too much to force you to remember, 'cause the day you and I met was probably the worst of your life." 

_If you just "valued me" you_ would _force me to remember,_ I thought. After all, I was only an asset if I was whole-heartedly on his side, right? If I hadn't know what he was, I would almost have thought he cared about my feelings. But that was ridiculous. This was a _Dark Lord_ I was talking to, the leader of Shabranigdo's armies, who fed off pain and terror. 

And yet, I found his presence comfortable. And comforting. No matter how I fought it, talking to him was like talking to an old friend. 

Could he possibly feel the same way? 

"It's too easy to let stuff slip when I'm talking to you," he added, after a moment. "I keep on letting myself forget, just for half a second here and there, then catching myself." 

Was he actually getting maudlin? I fished for a change of subject, and found, "I'm surprised you consider the pirates scum. I thought you Mazoku approved of low-lives like them." 

Ocean-blue eyes looked at me gravely. "First of all, I haven't been working with the other Mazoku in a long time. Secondly, all evil isn't created alike, and not all Mazoku have the same preferences in the type of evil they deal with. Zelas likes subtle evil, spying and politics. Dynast likes bureaucracy, totalitarian evil, grinding things down and rotting them out from the inside. Me, I like a good army and a well-run war, blood-lust and directed violence. It's kind of ironic, but while we were created to return the world to the Sea of Chaos, I've always needed a certain amount of order to do my job properly. Anyway, the pirates are the lowest kind of evil, founded on self-interest and without any goal in mind other than enjoying themselves—disorderly and impossible to all get pointed in the same direction for very long. Which means they're of limited use. Thirdly, all that muddy self-enjoyment crap makes them taste bad." He grimaced, as though to emphasise the point. 

I snorted. "Taste bad? And I don't?" 

"No, little dragon, you don't at all. You're fierce in everything you do. I find your emotions very tasty indeed." There it was again—that arrogant smirk that put me oddly at ease even as it pissed me off. 

"Is that what you look for in a Priest?" No matter how hard I tried, it was difficult to knock him off-balance for more than a couple of seconds. He was like one of those stupid toys with the weighted bases, the ones that always bob back upright after you poke them. 

My question managed to sober him again for a few seconds, though. "Not at all. We do feed off the lesser Mazoku under our command to some extent, but we don't create servants for that purpose alone . . . or at least I never did. I wouldn't put anything past fucking Phibby, though." 

"That doesn't explain anything." I fingered the sand-coloured carpet, watching him. 

Gaav's eyes were almost boring a hole in me, but his shrug was casual. "I lost my original General and Priest not long after I met you, and you stepped into their place just as smoothly as though you'd been made for it. And if you're going to start asking me shit about the past, I'm going to talk to the pirates." 

He heaved himself to his feet, slung his sword over his shoulder . . . and walked straight through the rock wall, which, in my opinion, was cheating. Well, at least he wouldn't be doing something like that with anyone nearby, so I figured it was safe for me to teleport through the wall and out into the tunnel. 

The caverns were a tangle of tunnels and spaces, but you could tell which tunnels were actually in use by following the wet footprints, tracked-in sand, and soot marks from torches at around Gaav's shoulder height. Some areas even had extra torches stuck to the walls, giving off dim, flickering light. I conjured a Lighting spell anyway, since I couldn't wear the glowing Valwin's feather token openly in a place like this, and kept it until I suddenly stepped out of the mouth of a cave and into the late afternoon sunlight. 

Gaav had tended upward when we'd had a choice of directions, but we still hadn't made it to the top of the cliff. Well, not exactly. We were on a wooden platform—more old ship timbers—built out from what had originally been a six-inch ledge. It was about three feet by five feet, and the far end offered access to a ravine that cut steeply into the cliff. Gaav raised one shaggy eyebrow slightly, and headed for that ravine. I stayed on the platform for a moment, though, looking out over the harbour. 

I think what impressed me most was how _dead_ the area was. The only hints of green on the rock and sand were either right by the waterline, or else very localized and probably due to some activity of the pirates'. Wasn't there supposed to be at least a _little_ life in your average desert, scattered here and there? 

Something too large to be a roach scuttled over my foot, and I tensed, scanning the area. A large, sleek rat gave me a look that suggested it was laughing at me, then sauntered back into the cave entrance it must have just emerged from, one far too small to admit human beings. 

"Not that kind of life," I muttered out loud, and headed for where Gaav's garish yellow coat was just disappearing into the ravine. I didn't know how he kept wearing that thing in this heat, although I had yet to see him take it off. Hell, I was starting to wonder if it was a part of his body. 

The ravine had a pseudo-roof of tattered sail canvas held to the stone walls with pegs, keeping some of the sun off while still admitting dappled light. Then, twenty paces or so in, it opened up into what must have been the pirates' party pad. 

It might have been the one place in the whole cavern complex that they actually kept tidy. One rocky overhang sheltered several small casks, and I could faintly smell rum. Another similar overhang protected a crude barbecue: half a metal barrel raised up on stones, with a grill lying across the top. But most of the space was taken up by a deep pool of water. There were no canopies or overhangs there, so the light fell straight across it, leaving it sun-warmed and sparkling. 

It was also occupied. Four naked pirates lounged in the water with blissful expressions on their faces and their arms propped on the rocky edge. One of them glanced toward Gaav and me as we sauntered in. It took me a moment to recognize him as Captain Lannis, even though his hook-and-chain weapon was lying within arm's reach on the edge of the pool. 

"Hah! Well, if it isn't our new friends. Plenty of room for a couple more, and if you've been sailing with the fish, I'd bet you haven't seen a bathtub in weeks, so come on in!" 

"Don't mind if I do," Gaav replied easily. "Although I've got to admit, I'm surprised you guys bother to wash up." 

Lannis laughed. "Well, it isn't like we don't have the water for it—the desal filter we've got is supposed to be good for twelve hundred people, and we've only usually got sixty-odd at a time—and I'd rather get wet now and again than have to pick lice out of my hair. Not all of the men agree, mind you, and there're a few even I prefer to stay strictly upwind of. Soap and buckets are over there, if you want to sluice off first." That last was said in a tone that made it more of an order than a suggestion. 

"Right," was all Gaav said. He took off his sword harness first, then began to work on the coat. Meanwhile, I took my shirt off, pretending I wasn't watching him as he slowly revealed black trousers, a pair of scuffed ankle boots, and a tan shirt whose sleeves stopped just short of his elbows. There was a sprinkle of red hair on his forearms, and old, faint scars, like you'd expect a swordsman to have. 

A big scar, running from his shoulder almost to his navel, showed itself when he stripped the shirt off. It was massive, ugly, and still slightly inflamed. Recent, in other words. And I didn't think he'd put it there on purpose. I wondered whether it represented Lina Inverse's attack on him with the Ragna Blade, or Phibrizzo's backstab. Maybe a bit of both . . . or it could have been something else entirely, something I didn't know about. 

After the scar, the next thing I noticed was the muscles. Gaav wasn't just big, he was powerful, like Orm, the longshoreman who won every arm-wrestling match in Copper Cove that didn't involve me. And unlike Orm, Gaav didn't have even a hint of a beer gut. 

He dropped his pants without the least self-consciousness, and it turned out that he didn't even have the redeeming quality of having a small dick. In fact, he was hung like the god he was. _Bastard,_ I thought. 

"If I didn't know better, I'd think you were ogling me," he said with a smirk. 

I rolled my eyes. "No, you conceited ass, I'm just wondering if you still have a sideline in posing for heroic statues." 

"I haven't been that hard up for cash lately," the Dark Lord said easily. "You going to take the rest of that off, or should I just dump a bucket over your head?" 

Telling myself that I had nothing to be ashamed of, I undid my belt and let my trousers fall, then stripped off my boxers. Instead of watching me covertly, Gaav gave me a single raking glance that took everything in, then said, "You've lost some weight," and turned away. 

I growled and threw an empty bucket at him. He caught it, without even turning to look, and opened a tap sticking out of the rockface to fill it with water. 

It took a lot of buckets to wash six feet of hair, but Gaav somehow managed to do it quickly and efficiently without seeming to hurry. He wrung it out afterwards and dropped into the pool while I was still rinsing my back—the places where my wings connected to my body in my true form were sensitive and had to be washed with some care, to the extent that I could reach them at all in human form. By the time I got to the pool, I had the choice of getting in beside Lannis or beside Gaav. Scowling, I picked Gaav, and settled in beside him on the smooth floor of the pool. The sun-warmed water was nice, I had to admit. More importantly, the pirates seemed to have let their guards down. 

"You two must have known each other for years, to be such good friends," Lannis was saying. 

"Fuck, I'm not even sure how long it's been," Gaav said easily. "I have a hard time remembering not knowing Val." 

I grunted. Let them interpret that whatever way they wanted. 

"Never mind that, though," the Dark Lord continued. "I'm more curious about you people. How much business are you doing, really?" 

"You came out here not knowing?" Lannis grinned broadly. 

Gaav shrugged. "I know you've got the Elmekians scared too shitless to come after you, and that was good enough for us. Still, I'd like to know if we're going to get filthy stinking rich out of this, or just a little bit rich." 

Lannis laughed. "Oh, I like you. We're hoping for filthy stinking rich, but really, it depends on what the trade winds blow us. We're doing our best to be selective in what we attack, so that the shipping doesn't dry up. We've taken some nice cargoes, and I have contacts in Ralteague who're happy to take whatever we send them, no questions asked. And the Elmekian navy is toothless, and no one else bothers to patrol this stretch of coastline. I'd say we've got a pretty good chance." 

"I hear the Elmekians are getting even more toothless as time goes on, with their ships disappearing out from under their crap excuse for a navy." 

"Heh. Truth is, it isn't tough to make their ships disappear. Until the Barrier opened up, they had no _real_ sailors at all, just people who messed around on lakes and such. So they're easy to catch. A lot more difficult to fight, but . . ." 

"But?" Gaav prompted. 

Lannis shook his head. "Not yet. Liking you doesn't mean that you couldn't be—" 

"What, Elmekian spies?" Gaav's snort told everyone exactly what he thought of that. "There isn't enough money in the world to convince us to work for them, trust me. Not that they'd spend all the money in the world on something like this even if they had it—they're a bunch of tight-fisted pricks with no balls. If they weren't, they'd have given out a bunch of letters of marque to make sure someone stayed on your—on _our_ —tails." 

Lannis gestured agreement. "So, what were you guys doing before you met up with us? If you don't mind my asking, that is. Nobody here _has_ to give away more of the past than they want." 

"Well, we were caught up in a bit of a mess down south . . ." Gaav spun a tale of a pair of mercenary-adventurers, a lost temple, and a very large tribe of trolls who had parked themselves directly on top of said temple. Parts of it might even have been true, and the exaggerations he did make were on a human scale—no _Then I turned into a three-headed demon dragon and fried all the slimy bastards_ , just a lot of improbable swordplay. I had to pay attention, too, because now and again someone would glance at me, and I'd have to add a detail or two that didn't contradict anything. 

We got out of the water all wrinkled and went down to supper—the pirates served a common meal at about the level of what they got on shipboard, which meant a lot of fish stew and not much else. I didn't give a damn, since it was the first hot food of any kind I'd had since we left port. Once more, it was Gaav who kept the conversation around us going, while I kept my attention on my bowl. If we stayed here for more than a couple of days, I was going to pick up a reputation as a grumpy near-mute . . . but the truth was, I didn't want to talk to these people. Didn't want to get to know them. 

Not when I was pretty sure we were going to have to kill them. 

I'd never actually killed anyone before—brass demons and zombies didn't count. I'd come close, once, in a dockside brawl, when I'd accidentally used a little too much force ramming someone's head up against a wall, but I hadn't quite shattered his skull, and a quick casting of Resurrection had pulled him through. When I thought of killing, something cold seemed to spread through me. Cold, but solid. I knew I could do it. I wasn't afraid of it. But I knew I should have been. 

How could there be so much wrong with me inside? A cold-blooded killer who found a Dark Lord's presence comfortable and reassuring . . . but I also had too much conscience to be able to watch innocent people die. My ego, my _self_ , was built of parts that didn't quite fit together, and I— 

"Val. Hey." At the sound of Gaav's voice speaking my name, I realized that I'd been staring for some time at an empty tin bowl. 

I shook my head. "Sorry. I was thinking." 

"Must have been some pretty heavy thoughts. Look, I don't know about you, but I'm going to turn in." 

Actually, what he wanted was for _me_ to catch some sleep, to ensure that I'd be . . . functioning properly . . . for our investigation and jail raid tonight. Even though the last thing I wanted to do right now was sleep. 

"Fine," I growled, and rose from the bench we'd both been sitting on. I followed Gaav back through the twisting caverns, into the quiet little nest we'd made for ourselves. 

That seemed to be my life lately. Following Gaav. Damn it all. 

Suddenly, the Dark Lord's hands came to rest on my shoulders. Not like a human's would, either, but lower down, with only his fingertips hooked over the tops, and the heels of his hands resting against my wing-roots. It was a very intimate, although not necessarily sexual, touch for a dragon, and it sent odd hot tingles through me. 

"Val," he said. "It's going to be fine." 

"Why the hell do you care? I thought you found my negative feelings _tasty_ ," I snarled. 

"There's plenty of food out there in the world for me. I don't need you, specifically, to provide it. No matter how tasty you are." Gaav hesitated for half a beat, then added, "I have a lot of contradictory impulses when it comes to you, little dragon, but overall, I want to see you happy, now that you've got a second chance. For that, I'm willing to give up on the idea of having you at my side." He made a soft sound that wasn't quite a chuckle. "Ragradia's last joke, I guess. I shouldn't give a flying fuck, but . . . I do." 

"Not enough to stop beating around in the bush, clearly. You keep throwing out these hints about the past, about you and me, but you never really _say_ anything. How did I meet you? Why would I join you? Why do I remember growing up in Lansheed with Filia and Jillas and Gravos rather than anything about you at all? _Why the fuck won't you tell me anything?!_ " 

"Because if I tell you, you might start to remember—if the muscle memory is there, I'd bet everything else is too. And then any chance you might have had to be happy is going to be gone for good." 

I growled wordlessly. "That's already not working. Ever since I hatched, I've had a bunch of crap sloshing around inside me that I can't handle except like this." I held up my left arm, and tugged on the bandage wrapped from wrist to elbow. "And you're talking about _happiness_? I've _never_ been happy!" 

"Survivor's guilt." 

"What?" It seemed like a total non-sequitur. 

"You always felt guilty that you were the only one to make it out alive. That you were the last of the ancient dragons. You never felt that you deserved to live. It tore you up inside. And I don't want to see it happen again. I'm hoping that if you don't remember the dead as individuals, you'll be able to throw it off, because nothing else ever worked. Now, try to get some sleep." 

_Like hell,_ I thought, but I settled down anyway, curling up among the cushions with my back to Gaav's. We weren't quite touching, but there was no space in here for us to be all that far apart, either. 

I dreamed of flying in the dark. Flying, and falling, and pain.


	11. Chapter 10

"Val. Hey, Val." 

I jerked and came awake. Lying on my side . . . with my back pressed against something warm . . . The recent past came back in a rush, and I flinched, jerking forward, away from Gaav. 

"Bad dreams?" the Dark Lord asked softly. 

"None of your business," I growled back. "Don't we have something we're supposed to be doing?" 

"Yeah, we do." Did I or didn't I hear a hint of a sigh there? "Most of the pirates are asleep. There a couple that I think are standing watch outside, plus a half-dozen more concentrated in two areas . . . plus the ones that stumble out of bed to take a leak, but they don't matter. Anyway, I figure one of the two groups has to be guarding whatever passes for their treasury, or maybe the water filter, and the other has to be outside the prison. Can't tell which is which, though, so we might have to check them both. We'll start with the nearest one." 

"What are we waiting for, then?" 

"I thought you'd like to know what's going on, but if you'd prefer I just order you around . . ." 

The response stuck in my teeth, because I would and I wouldn't. I _did_ want to know what was going on, but as usual, I was pissed off by the fact he was being nice to me. I _wanted_ him to be a horrible, monstrous ogre that I couldn't free myself from quickly enough, not this . . . teacher, older-brother-figure . . . _friend_. 

_I like him._ Every time that thought crossed my mind, I felt a shattering wave of guilt and self-disgust. What was it inside me that was so bent out of shape that I would _like_ a Mazoku? What kind of dragon was I? 

"Val." He was on his feet, sword slung across his back, visible by the glow of the talisman he'd given me. I stuffed the silver feather back inside my shirt to make it less visible and drew on my swordbelt. He took hold of my upper arm. I tried to shake free, but I had to wait until he let me go, a few seconds later, out in the corridor. I'd barely even noticed the teleport. 

"This way," he added. There was just enough light for me to pick up a hint of a silhouette to follow. 

We went down this time. Down a sloping tunnel, then out into one of the built sections of the building and down a flight of stairs and back into the rockface. I gritted my teeth. All dragons have just a touch of claustrophobia in human-sized spaces, since we can't return to our true forms there without injuring ourselves. I'd thought I was better at dealing with it than most, since I'd spent most of my time in human form while I'd been growing up, but something about the silence and the near-dark made me more aware of the massive weight of rock above my head. I forced myself to continue following Gaav . . . and had to grit my teeth even harder to keep from cursing as I ran into his back. Belatedly, I noticed that there was more light coming from up ahead than I'd been seeing so far, suggesting that we'd now reached one of our groups of wakeful pirates. 

"Looks like we've found it," Gaav murmured—inside my head, as far as I could tell. "Two guards. You know 'Sleeping'?" 

_Yes._ I wasn't sure he could see my nod, so I tried to beam the thought at him too. 

"No need to burst a vein, little dragon—I can hear you loud and clear. Cast it, then. I've got to be ready to catch the one guy and keep him from crashing to the floor." 

That went off like clockwork: I cast, Gaav teleported, I came around the corner just in time to see him lay a pirate down on the floor. The other man had been seated, and now had his head tilted back and propped against the wall. I'd bet that if he stayed that way long enough, he was going to start snoring. 

The cave we were in had a deep alcove on the far side that was barred off from the rest of the room by timbers inserted into crudely carved slots in the ceiling and floor, kept from tilting and coming loose by nailed-on cross-braces. As a prison, it was definitely the budget model, and you would have to be careful your captive didn't get his hands on an open flame—it had to be captive, singular, because there wasn't really room for more than one person. The alcove was about seven feet by three feet at its deepest point, which put it on a par with a stack of coffins, sizewise. 

There was one person in there now, slumped in an awkward heap with wavy mint-green hair falling forward into his face. 

"Fuck, neither of them has the keys," Gaav said after bending over the pirate sleeping in the chair. 

"Just a second," I said. Unlock was a spell I wasn't really supposed to know—Sleeping has therapeutic uses, as a general anesthetic and for simply forcing overtired people to rest, but there aren't many good reasons for knowing Unlock. As a result, I didn't use it often, and it took a bit of thought to bring the Power Words to mind. I cast it in a quick mutter of syllables with the padlock on the cell door cupped in the palm of my hand. I expect Gaav could have done it too, if he'd wanted to. He might even have looked for the keys only because he wanted this to look as mundane as possible when the pirates found out about it. 

I grabbed Zoanel by the arm and hauled him up, intending to sling him across my shoulders like a sack of potatoes. Normally someone hit by Sleeping won't wake up even if you work him over with a mop handle, but I guess our rescuee must have been right on the edge of the spell's effective range, because he made a sound like "Hunght?" and then suddenly screamed like a little girl. Right in my ear. 

"Shut up!" I hissed, and put my hand over his mouth to make sure he got the message. "Your parents sent us to get your ass out of here, you ungrateful son of a bitch. And we've got some questions we'd like to ask you." 

The little bastard bit me. Hard enough to draw blood, which takes some doing for a human biting a dragon. And then he slipped out of my grip when I jerked my hand back, and ran for the mouth of a hallway. 

Gaav grabbed him by the hair before he could quite get clear and wrenched him back around, sending him stumbling into my arms just as some pirates ran in through a different exit. Gaav's sword caught them in mid-step while I wrestled with Zoanel. In the end, I managed to pin Zoanel's arms to his sides and lift him bodily off the ground, leaving his legs to windmill ineffectually in the air. 

Gaav shook the blood from his sword and rescabbarded it. "I hope you realize you just killed those two stupid sons of bitches. And fucked up our plan for getting out of here. And if I draw Deep-Sea's attention because you were a fucking idiot, I'm feeding you to her. Feet first. One inch at a time." 

Zoanel was still trying to get a good angle to kick me, so I'm not sure he heard. Gaav came over the stand beside me and put his hand on my shoulder, and space wrenched itself around us and . . . turned into something else. I'm not even sure how to describe it. We were _somewhere_ , but it was a place whose laws didn't match up with the normal world. Distance didn't matter there, but there were other forces, dimensions . . . things that I _almost_ grasped in the moment before we returned to reality again. 

The sound of the waves very nearby and the feel of a deck lurching under my feet told me that we weren't still in the cave. I dumped Zoanel on his ass on the ground and invoked a Lighting spell, which showed me part of a railing, and a lot of crates. But they were familiar crates. 

We were back on the Miss Mermaid. Zoanel's head was whipping around, his eyes wide. I ignored him and sat down on a crate so that I could cast Recovery on my bitten hand. He'd only just broken the skin, but that was more than enough as far as I was concerned. And besides, who knew what he'd been eating, or how long it had been since he'd brushed his teeth? My hand might get infected if I wasn't careful. 

Truth be told, I hadn't been feeling very charitable towards the green-haired man even before he'd bitten me. What kind of idiot mistook Hellmaster for some non-existent god . . . thing? Hadn't the zombies and other general nastiness given him some kind of clue? 

"What's going on?" Two heads, one of them bearing a disreputable hat, popped up above a wall of crates. Okay, that settled it: Zangulus _did_ sleep in that damned thing. And despite it, he was the sanest one in that family. 

"You're back!" Martina added. "But in that case, where's . . . Zoey!" She swooped forward and wrapped herself around the young man, who was still trying to get to his feet. "Oh, Zoey! You're alive! You're all right! You're—" 

"Let him breathe, dear," Zangulus said as his son made a choking noise. 

"You haven't really been wearing that in public, have you, Mom?" the younger man asked as soon as he could breathe again. Really, calling him a _man_ might have been a bit much. I would have been surprised if he was seventeen. This was the first time I'd gotten a good enough look at him to notice the pimple on his chin. 

Martina blinked, clearly clueless about just how much eccentric behaviour from one's parents could embarrass an adolescent. "Of course I have." 

"Great Zoamelgustar . . . Not at home. Please tell me that you weren't wearing it anywhere near home, or I'll never be able to show my face to my friends again." 

"Look, you three, have the fucking reunion later," Gaav said. "We didn't save his ass for the sake of this familial shit." 

Zoanel squinted up into my Lighting spell. I didn't bother moving it. "Then why _did_ you save me? I don't know you guys—or at least I don't think I do. Unless I met you while I was too drunk to realize I was joining up with a bunch of pirates." 

"No, you don't know us," I said. "And if you've got any sense, you'll keep it that way." 

"We've just got some questions we want to ask you," Gaav rumbled. "About this." 

He held out the jar fragment. Zoanel looked down at the little piece of broken pottery resting in the Dark Lord's hand and said, "Oh, crap." 

"At least you're not going to pretend you don't know what it is, then. Good." 

"You don't have to answer anything they ask you, Zoey. The Lord Zoamelgustar will—" 

"Do nothing at all," her son said through gritted teeth. "Not about this, anyway." His eyes met Zangulus' over Martina's head, and father and son exchanged a long-suffering look. "Ask your questions." 

"Fine. Where did you find the jar?" 

Zoanel shrugged. "I was shopping for new socks and the seller threw it in as a freebie. She'd picked it up as part of a shipment of curiosities, but she didn't want it either—not an ugly, broken thing like that. At the time, neither of us realized there was anything special about it. I even tried to get rid of it a couple of times, but no one would take it, and whenever I tried to throw it away, it seemed like someone ended up bringing it back to me. It wasn't until later on, when I tried to open it up to see what I could fit inside, that it started talking to me, telling me not to open it yet. You do know it talks, right?" 

"We're asking the questions here," I snapped. "Where is the jar now?" 

Another shrug. "I don't know." 

"Look, you—" 

Gaav held up a hand, and I forced myself to swallow back the rest of my sentence. "How did you lose it, then?" 

"The pirates took it away from me when I told them I didn't ever want to use it again. I think maybe it went out with the _Red Skull_ after that." 

"And where's the _Red Skull_?" 

"How should I know? Headed back up toward Tishan, maybe. Or down towards the Coastal States. They left the harbour almost a week ago, but by then, no one was talking to me." 

"Fuck," Gaav muttered, scowling. "Well, that's just great." 

He didn't seem to have any more questions, so I said, "One last thing: Why did you tell them you weren't going to use the jar anymore?" 

"How could I ever use it when I know what that thing does? I cracked the seal just once, when we were on that navy ship, and it . . . oh, Zoamelgustar . . ." The boy made a gagging sound. "That's how I knew it wasn't really him in the jar. Lord Zoamelgustar is evil, but not . . . that kind of evil. Not like the Mazoku. He helps us take vengeance on our enemies, but he would never make a ship full of zombies or . . . not anything like that." 

Gaav snorted. "More to the point, we have no idea now where the fucking thing is . . . although I'd bet it's on its way back to Elmekia." 

Several blinks. It was Zangulus who asked, tentatively, " . . . Why?" 

"Because it's more of a pain in the ass than having it end up in the Coastal States, and the universe never lets you have it easy. Listen, if you find the _Red Skull_ or the jar or anything when you hit port, send a message to the Broken Oar in Tishan—we'll get it somehow." 

"You're heading back up that way, then," Zangulus said. 

Gaav shrugged. "It's all we can do. We need someone to check each destination, and you can't get back there without finding another boat, so it's obvious who has to go which way. I'm sure you'd rather not travel with us anyway. Val, if you left anything here you want to grab, now's the time." 

My single change of clothes and tiny amount of travelling gear were inside the space-twist he'd shown me how to make. "No, I've got everything." 

"Good." 

I felt his hand on my shoulder, and then we were back in that twisting not-space. Again, I felt like I almost grasped . . . something . . . about it, but we didn't stay there long enough for me to be sure. 

We emerged in the dark, and I blinked and reconjured my Lighting spell. We were standing on a headland in the middle of nowhere, with the ocean lapping at the rocks below us. 

"We fly the rest of the way," Gaav said. "It's only about an hour, and no one's going to see us in the dark." 

"Why not just teleport all the way there?" I asked irritably. 

"'Cause this way, even if someone finds my trace, one end's over the ocean and the other's at the ass-end of nowhere. They can search for days, and they won't find anything except the pirates." 

I snorted. "And the great Lord Gaav is scared of whatever might find him?" 

"When what might find me includes Dynast, Zelas, Dolphin, and any Shards of Shabranigdo they've been able to round up, all in a pack? You'd better fucking well bet it scares me. Phibby took me out with a surprise hit, but Dynast and Zelas are more . . . thorough. If _they_ catch up with me, I might not be coming back next time. Not that I suppose anyone but me would care." 

He wore an odd expression. Could he actually be . . . lonely? No, of course Mazoku couldn't . . . 

"Pure Mazoku can't," the Dark Lord said, cutting off my thought. "Sometimes I think the thing I hate most about what Ragradia did to me is what it taught me about mortal emotions . . . although if I were to be strictly honest, I always had a better grasp on those than most of the others. Can't run an army if you don't know what makes your men tick. Anyway, we're wasting time. Let's go." 

Baleful red light rippled around him, obscuring his form and stretching upward until a massive blood-coloured dragon loomed above me. He had to be the largest of our kind I had ever seen. Three blue-eyed serpentine heads gazed down at me, and he made an abortive movement with his wings, almost as though he'd been about to preen them. Then there was another ripple of red, and he shrank down slightly, re-absorbed two of his heads, and changed colour. A black dragon, a very big one, but still more . . . natural-seeming . . . than his red-scaled self. 

"Are you coming, or are you going to sit here and sulk?" he asked, leaning down. 

I smirked. "You think you're going to be able to keep up with me?" 

I ran for the edge of the headland and jumped. I saw Gaav's eyes widen in the instant before I killed my Lighting spell to free up that portion of my power and concentration—returning to my true form was easy, but doing so in such a tiny slice of time was more difficult, and if I'd misjudged the height of the headland, I might have to cast Levitation in a hurry to avoid ending up splattered on the rocks at the bottom. 

The change came just in time, and I skimmed low over the ocean, feeling the spray against my wings as I flapped carefully, trying to send myself upward without also getting a dunking. I could hear the sound of other wings fanning the wind not far away, and after a moment, a large silhouette blotted out the stars. 

"Crazy dragon! You're going the wrong way!" 

"If I'm crazy, what does that make you for hanging around me?" I retorted. 

Gaav snorted. "Bored with life, probably. Turn about thirty degrees to your left." 

As our wings ate up the miles, I wondered if we'd ever done this before. Flown together, that was. Who was the person he'd been looking at, the one who occupied the same space as me, that he'd been talking to as we stood on the headland? What had he been like, that other Val that I didn't remember? Had he been happy? Not all the time, maybe, but now and again? 

And why did I want to know, when I was sure I didn't want to remember even if I could?


	12. Chapter 11

I reined in my horse and pulled my facecloth down so that I could take a drink from my canteen. I was getting tired of Gaav's insistence on verisimilitude and giving the appearance of being human, but he was stubborn about it, and I found myself deferring to him without thinking a lot of the time. Especially when I wasn't paying attention. It pissed me off. Okay, so he was effectively a god, but he was an evil god, and I shouldn't be listening to him. 

We hadn't actually ridden through the desert between Port Tishan and Elmekia proper. After arriving at the port city and discovering that the Red Skull and the jar had both come and gone, departing in separate directions after a run-in with what was left of the Elmekian navy, we'd bought horses and some supplies, dressed for desert travel, ridden off along the caravan road through the Desert of Destruction . . . and promptly teleported a hundred miles or more as soon as we were out of sight of the city and any other travellers, to where the sand and sun-scorched rock began to turn into pasture again. 

Gaav hadn't stopped when I did, so when I kneed my horse into motion again, I pushed it a little harder than I had until now, and nearly bit my tongue as it erupted into a bone-jarring trot. Stupid nag. Okay, so a couple of lessons when I'd been just a hatchling hardly made me an expert horseman, but it should have been able to figure that out and react accordingly. Even if it had been able to smell dragon on me, we didn't normally eat horses . . . and anyway, it was only my thighs and ass that I'd allowed to scale over, to prevent saddle sores. Completely invisible under my clothes. 

I caught up to Gaav at the crest of a grassy hill. The only horse we'd been able to find in a hurry that was up to his weight was a big plodder of a draft horse that would probably have been happier in front of a wagon. The Dark Lord had worked some kind of spell on it that I didn't understand in order to break it to saddle . . . and then he'd had to make the saddle, just to add insult to injury. I'd smirked as I watched him scowl, eyebrows almost completely hiding his eyes. Now I was just glad it made it difficult for him to get too far ahead. 

He was staring down the hill and frowning as his horse ambled forward. I couldn't see why. The land was sloping down into a valley up ahead, but we'd seen that a couple of times since teleporting to this side of the desert. And the town in the valley didn't look especially odd to me. Well, except for the mass of tents pitched at the end nearest us, but that kind of made sense if they got a lot of transient caravan people. There were corrals mixed in, and then the permanent buildings began further on. 

"You look like you just ate a lemon," I said after several moments of silence. 

Gaav shook his head. "The last time I was here, that town was a fucking hamlet. Six houses, a general store, and twenty sheep for every human. Seeing it like this just rubs in what happened to me. That I screwed up." 

"And screwing up isn't acceptable, of course," I drawled . . . and was nearly knocked out of my saddle by the sharp glare of blue eyes. 

"Not to me, it isn't," Gaav growled. "Not that kind of screw-up. We're not talking about tripping over the corner of a rug and dropping a teacup, here. We're talking about something that might have ended with the entire fucking _world_ being dropped back into the Sea of Chaos. Hell, I'm still not sure why that _didn't_ happen. The only thing I can think of is that She didn't want it that way." 

"'She'?" 

"The Lord of Nightmares. The one who created the world, and Ceiphied and Ruby-Eye, and so, indirectly, me and you." 

"As I understand it . . . that's pretty much exactly what happened." 

"Hmm?" 

"Lina Inverse's Giga Slave spell went out of control when she faced down Phibrizzo and ended up summoning the Lord of Nightmares into this world. The Lord of Nightmares apparently likes what we've been doing to the place or something, because she mulched Hellmaster instead of destroying the world. I thought you knew." 

Gaav shook his head. "I knew the little fucker was gone, but this is the first I've heard about how he died, except for gossip. How sure are you that that's what happened?" 

I shrugged. "I had it from Zelgadis. He saw most of it." 

"The chimera," Gaav said slowly. "It's probably true, then, but how did you meet him?" 

"My foster-mother knows him, so he came by our place a couple of times when I was small. He wanders around a lot." 

Gaav was still frowning, but it was a thoughtful kind of frown. "This foster mother of yours . . . Who is she, exactly?" 

"Her name is Filia Ul Copt. She travelled with Lina Inverse for a while." 

"Ul Copt . . . that's a golden dragon name." 

"Yes, it is. What?" I added as Gaav gave me an odd look. 

"You used to hate golden dragons more than anything, that's all." 

"I can't imagine why." 

"And I'm not going to tell you." 

I growled. Bad idea, because my horse didn't appreciate predator-like sounds coming from its back. It shot up on its hind legs, dumped me off, and took off down the cart track we were following at a rapid pace. 

Gaav snorted and pulled his horse, which hadn't reacted, to a stop. "You all right, little dragon?" 

"Why do you care?" I snarled as I got my feet back under me and started dusting dirt off my ass. 

"Because if you're injured and can't heal yourself, you'll hold me back." 

It was a perfectly rational reason that might have applied even to a Mazoku, so why did it feel so off? 

"You're lying," I growled. 

"Well, the truth in this case isn't something you'd be willing to listen to anyway. Now, are you going to get up so we can go after that horse of yours?" 

That meant me getting up behind him on his horse and trying to find a position where the edge of his saddle didn't leave dents in some very sensitive portions of my anatomy. It also meant putting my arms around him to make sure I stayed on, and when I did, I felt a very strong impulse just to bury my face in the back of that damned coat of his and make the world go away. One more way for him to piss me off, I guess. He smelled like a dragon, though, with a hint of reptile musk added to the normal sweaty-human-male scent. It was comforting, and as usual, I didn't want it to be. 

How many ways had he found to piss me off without even trying? I'd kind of lost track now. I told myself over and over again that it was all just the same buried memories that flooded me with guilt and drove me to take my claws to my own flesh that made me find him . . . likable. Not anything he was or wasn't, that he did or didn't do. 

We caught up with my horse right at the edge of town, where it was making a mess of someone's garden, and just where the hell had the stupid animal learned you could get carrots by pawing at the earth, anyway? Not very _big_ carrots, mind you, not at this time of year, but it didn't seem to care. Until I tried to approach it, that was. It gave me a nasty look and skittered away when I got within ten feet. In the end, I had to cast Sleeping on it before I could grab the reins. Meanwhile, Gaav was laughing so hard he almost pitched off his own horse. 

He wasn't at all likable, just then. I told myself I was glad. 

The town, like Port Tishan, did have a certain newness to it. Copper Cove had had its share of crumbling mortar and pockmarked brick. Here, anything that looked at all worn was built from wood. The streets were packed dirt, although someone would probably get around to laying down stone eventually if the town remained this prosperous. We seemed to be riding down the main street, lined with shops whose signs indicated they housed harnessmakers, smiths, caravan provisioners, inns, restaurants . . . 

I looked at Gaav and raised my eyebrows. 

«It was here, all right,» his voice murmured in my head. «He carried it right up this street. The problem's going to be figuring out where the fuck he went afterwards. I think we're three or four days behind, so Phibby must be speeding up his travel, and I wouldn't put it past the little shit to start laying false trails at this point. Even thought I've been scrambling my signature, he would have noticed that someone powerful had been in Port Tishan. And there're several different places he could head to from here.» 

«So we're going to have to look for them the old-fashioned way,» I replied, also in silence. Somewhere between here and the pirate stronghold, I'd figured out the trick of it. 

«Yeah. Legwork. With no description of the man we're looking for beyond 'short', 'dark', and 'bearded'. As if we fucking needed to work harder at this.» 

«Quit whining,» I told him, and was surprised to see the trace of a smile on his lips. 

«You're the only person who's ever had the balls to tell me that.» 

«Oh? I can't imagine why. Maybe it's that whole Dark Lord thing you have going?» 

I could see him clenching his jaw to keep from erupting into laughter, which would have looked odd to the passers-by who couldn't actually hear the conversation. «Maybe you're right. Think I should pretend to be a Dragon God instead?» 

«You'd never pull it off.» 

He snorted, and then spoke aloud. "If it's okay with you, I'd like to hit the stockyards first, 'cause I'm getting really tired of this fucking plowhorse." 

"You can have mine," I said sourly. 

"Not up to my weight . . . or I'd take it, and gladly." 

My stomach growled just then. "How about a restaurant, then the stockyards?" I suggested, knowing that he'd forgotten again that one of us needed to eat. 

"I guess that works." 

There were hitching rails every block or so along the street—I guess they got a lot of visitors riding or leading animals. The next time I saw one that wasn't too far from a restaurant, I got off my horse and tied the stupid critter up, hoping someone would steal it while we were eating. 

The restaurant looked so-so inside: it was clean enough, but shabby, and only one table was occupied, by a pair of men having an argument over a pitcher of something and a plate of sandwiches. 

" . . . tell you, that's what I saw!" one of them was saying, gesturing with a sandwich. "Must have been at least a dozen trolls, and they were all kneeling in a circle around this bearded guy!" 

I stiffened. Gaav frowned, eyes narrowing, and walked over to the table. 

"'Scuse me," he said. "You mind telling me where you saw this guy with the trolls?" 

The man who had been waving his sandwich around said, "I was on my way down from Troanna. Stopped for a piss by the side of the road near the limestone cliffs, and spotted him just as I was going to let fly over the edge. Would have wet down one of the trolls' heads if I had. And then the guy looked up and saw me, and I got the hell out of there. Didn't even stop to stuff myself back inside my pants until I caught up with the caravan. Good thing the bank was undercut there, and trolls aren't very good climbers, or I'd probably be inside something's belly right now." 

"Thanks," Gaav said, and began to turn away. 

"Don't tell me you actually believe that crap," the sandwich-waver's companion said. 

"Sure I do. If he's the guy who owes me all that money, then he speaks Trollish." 

That got him several blinks and a "Huh" from the one man, and a victorious grin from the other. 

"Owes you money?" I said once we'd found ourselves a table on the other side of the room. 

Gaav shrugged. "Can you think of a better reason we'd be looking for him?" 

"I suppose not." 

"Can I get something for you, handsome?" The waitress who had approached our table wore a kind of parody of a maid uniform, short-skirted and low-cut in front. She gave me a slight smile and leaned forward, putting her breasts at some risk of spilling out of her bodice. Or at least, that was what it looked like. My bet was that it actually wasn't that precarious. 

"What's cheap and good?" I asked her, smiling back. 

"Sandwiches, mostly. We've got stew, too, but you wouldn't believe what the cook puts into it," she said, rolling her eyes comically. "And don't even think of drinking the water. Tea and coffee are okay, though." 

"Sounds good. Get us a plate of sandwiches and a pot of tea." I knew Gaav wasn't much for tea, but he could just suck it up. Chances were that he wouldn't have any anyway. 

"Sure. Do you want roast beef or ham? Since neither of you seems like a bean-sprouts-and-ground-chickpeas type." 

"Roast beef." I'd never been much for ham. 

"Ooh, I like a man who knows what he wants." 

A sudden stab of pure rage shot along my bond with Gaav, and, surprised—both at the strength of his emotion and the loss of control—I turned to look at him. He was watching the waitress, his expression neutral, but there was a certain . . . flatness . . . in his eyes. If I hadn't known better, I'd have sworn her flirting had made him jealous, even though he had to know it hadn't been at all serious. I smirked. _Not used to being ignored, are you?_

Did he even have a sex drive? That was pure physical-body-stuff, as far as I knew. How mortal was he, really? 

The waitress laid her hand lightly on my upper arm for a moment as she said, "Now, just you wait here, handsome, and I'll be riiiiiight back with your order." 

She didn't quite make it to the kitchen before breaking out into giggles. 

Gaav shook his head. "Could she have been any more fucking clingy?" 

"Easily," I said, still smirking. "I mean, she never tried to drape herself across my lap, or anything like that." 

"Would you have wanted her to?" I couldn't tell what underlay the question, what response he was expecting. 

I shrugged. "We don't have time for that kind of crap right now. Do we?" 

"No, we don't." There was a hint of tension going out of him, his shoulders relaxing just a little. 

"Don't tell me you're worried I'd forget why we're here," I said . . . but no, I didn't think that was it, somehow. "What, did I used to be a total skank or something?" 

"Actually, the you I remember would have bitten her head off for having the brass to come on to you." Anyway, he did seem to have relaxed a little. 

"Huh. I must not have had much of a sex life." Unless there had been someone in particular . . . No, I didn't want to believe that. It would just end up messing with my head. I searched for a change of subject, and found, "So. Troanna. What kind of place is it? I assume we're heading there next." 

"City. Small. Elmekian. It's an independent province in its own right, or it used to be, instead of being part of one of the larger principalities. Beyond that, I have no idea. I haven't been there in nearly four hundred years." 

It took Gaav most of the afternoon to find a horse he considered half-decent that was also up to his weight, so we ended up staying the night at a random inn in the town whose name I never did find out. We even managed to get separate rooms, which meant that, for the first time in a long time, I didn't have to listen to his snoring. 

I told myself I didn't miss it. 

I wasn't surprised when he insisted, the next morning, that we travel like a pair of ordinary humans, either. Even I could see the logic this time: if the jar had taken some other path rather than going straight through to Troanna, we needed to know, and we'd definitely miss the turning if we teleported. Maybe even if we flew. So, on horseback it was. Provided I didn't lose my temper and eat my horse. 

The first couple of days went okay, although I don't think Gaav would have thought to stop for food and rest nearly as often if I hadn't been along. I often caught him looking at me and only then deciding on a halt. It raised my hackles, but there wasn't much I could do. I mean, I could have complained, sure, but if that resulted in him not stopping often enough, I'd be even worse off. 

On the third day, my horse nearly dumped me again. Gaav froze it in place with a gesture before it could follow through with it this time, and that familiar scowl slid over his face again. 

"Smell it?" 

I took a deep breath, picked up animal and sweat and the green smell of tree sap from the branches my horse had just broken, and . . . "Ugh! What _is_ that? Rotting meat?" Which meant . . . "Something's dead, isn't it?" 

"Yeah. If we're lucky, it's just someone else's fucking horse." His expression said he wasn't betting on being lucky. I wasn't either, although it might have been nice for once. 

Gaav looped the reins of his horse over a tree branch and left it beside my frozen mount. It didn't take us long to find the source of the smell. 

A short, bearded man lay on his back among some thorn bushes. I hoped he'd been dead already when he'd been thrown down onto them. Otherwise, his last few moments of life had to have been filled with agony. The ground around him was torn up, like a small army had been through there. 

"Trolls," Gaav said grimly. "And the jar was here, but it isn't now, unless it's hiding itself better than I think it's capable of." 

"I have a feeling I know what this means." 

"You're probably feeling right, but we're going to have to find somewhere to leave the horses first." Gaav turned to stare along the messy path the trolls had made when they left. He still looked very unhappy indeed.


	13. Chapter 12

It had been a troll den, clearly. Now it was a charred hole in a hillside, and the trolls were lumps of greasy ash. As a method of breaking their regenerative cycle, it was effective but brutal. 

I didn't think it could have been more than a day or two. The embers were cold to the touch, but the whole area still smelled of smoke, and the boot-prints and hoofprints left behind in the ashes were still hard-edged, not crumbled. 

"It isn't here, is it." It wasn't a question. I could tell from the expression on Gaav's face that he hadn't found what we were looking for. 

"It was, but it's moved on already. They probably picked up most of what was in the lair after they burned out the trolls, and took it back with them to see if they could return it to the original owners." 

"The question is, who were 'they'?" 

The Dark Lord tilted his head. "If I had to guess? Troannan city guard. This is close enough in that they would have felt an obligation to get rid of a bunch of trolls. I was hoping they would have left the jar behind, since it's supposed to be such a crappy-looking piece of work that they might have thought the trolls made it themselves, but it doesn't look like we're going to be that lucky." 

The part that pissed me off the most, I think, was that I had to get on that stupid horse again for a couple more hours. My riding had improved slightly (thanks to Gaav's coaching, damn it all), but I was still going to be glad to see the back of that annoying creature. 

From a distance, Troanna didn't look like much. It had been a walled city once, a very long time ago, but now houses and shops sprawled far beyond the grey line of the old fortification. Elmekia had been at peace for centuries, except for those times a warmongering emperor had landed on the throne and decided to try to invade Seyruun or Zephilia, and Troanna was far from the border. The road traffic thickened up as we got closer to the edge of the city, and my horse bounced and flinched and generally made a nuisance of itself when anyone got too close. If I had my way, I'd sell the creature for glue. Fortunately, it didn't object too much to following Gaav's much-better-behaved dull brown horse, even when we passed the point where the road properly became a street. 

The Dark Lord guided us straight up the main thoroughfare to a gate in the outgrown inner wall, which was, unexpectedly, guarded. People were being inspected, then let through in small groups. 

I expected Gaav to guide his horse to join the line-up, but instead he turned off down a side street. For once, my own stupid horse did something right and automatically followed his, or I might not have seen exactly which street. 

"There's no way you're going to convince me they brought it here," I said, eyeing the buildings on either side of the shabby street. 

"There weren't any other horses in that line-up at the gate. I doubt they'd admit ours." Gaav turned his horse again, heading us back out toward the edge of town. "And there weren't many other men either, and no groups consisting of men alone. The guards were all women too, even though hot-headed young men tend to be the mainstay of forces like that. Something's weird. We'll circle the edge of the city to make sure the fucking jar hasn't left again by a different gate, then find a bar and start buying people drinks or something. We need information." 

"You noticed all that just riding by?" 

A shrug. "The guards first—evaluating potential opponents. That made me look more closely at the other people." 

I tamped down the little voice in the back of my mind that was telling me that I should have noticed too, that I'd been careless and I couldn't afford that. Where the hell was that coming from, anyway? I wasn't in danger . . . except maybe due to my association with Gaav, but the other Dark Lords must have been aware of that while I'd been growing up, and none of them had done anything. I doubted they would have left me alone just because I didn't know about anything. They weren't nice people. Or . . . had Xellos dropped in at Filia's once or twice every year in order to keep an eye on me? No, that couldn't be it, given that I hadn't seen him since I'd left home. True, I'd been spending a lot of my time on sacred precincts, but it would take one hell of a blessing to keep the Beast-Priest out of somewhere that he wanted to be . . . 

"Wake up, little dragon—we're there." Gaav was pulling his horse to a stop in front of a big, rambling mass of an inn that seemed to have its own restaurant and bar. 

"Here?" I said. It looked clean and well-kept. Too well-kept. If that wasn't real gold leaf on the sign declaring this "The Stationary Caravan", then I would eat it. 

"Why not? Looks like it probably caters to merchants. They'll know what's what around here." 

"I don't think I can afford it," I said, flushing with anger and embarrassment. 

"So if it really bothers you, you can pay me back someday. Not that I give a flying fuck about money." 

"It isn't really about the money," I said through clenched teeth. 

"I know—it's about independence and all that shit. Well, what do you expect me to do about it? You won't let me just _give_ you the cash. We could take some time off to go bounty hunting or something, but I thought you were in a hurry to get rid of me." 

"You know, the thing that pisses me off the most about you is how _reasonable_ you can be," I growled. "You're not supposed to be reasonable, or kind or . . . or any of that!" And I wasn't supposed to be having this meltdown in the middle of a public street, but I seemed unable to stop the words. 

Gaav snorted. "No, you'd find it much easier if I just played into whatever shitty stereotype someone's loaded into your head. Too bad. Easy isn't always good for you. Plus, I promised you a long time ago that I would always tell _you_ the truth about anything that mattered. Pretending to be something other than what I am would be one hell of a lie. Don't worry, though. I'm not usually kind to anyone but you." He flashed me a quick smirk, then slid down off his horse. 

"Bastard." It was probably the word I spoke to him most often . . . but if I thought about it, what had he really done to deserve it? The stab of guilt was all too familiar, and yet . . . fresh. Just what I needed. I scowled and forced myself down off my horse . . . only to be intercepted by Gaav at the bottom. A big hand ruffled my hair, and . . . no, I wouldn't lie to myself about that anymore. It really was affection, and concern, that I saw in those blue eyes. 

"Don't think too hard, little dragon. It was never your strongest suit." 

I growled wordlessly . . . but I also felt the corners of my mouth twitch up. 

The Dark Lord handed our horses over, tipped the stableboy—who instantly became much more helpful with a silver piece in his hand—and walked into the inn radiating the aura of someone who knew he was in charge. That was always there to some extent, of course, but somehow he was slapping everyone across the face with it now. Even the garish coat he wore seemed like the acceptable eccentricity of a powerful man, under the influence of . . . whatever he was doing. 

The clerk at the desk blinked at him and adjusted his glasses. "Would you like a room, sir? Our best suite is still available, and, well . . . I am embarrassed to say, but its master bedroom likely has the only bed in our establishment that is likely to be large enough for a guest of your . . . presence." 

"That should do," Gaav said. There was a soft _chink_ as he set his hand briefly down on the counter, leaving behind a small pile of gold coins. "We'll probably be here for three days or so. If you have someone else who's made reservations for that suite . . . deal with them." 

"Understood, sir." The clerk glanced at me briefly, seeming to notice me for the first time, and took down two keys from a rack behind the counter. "Please take the stairs to the second floor—the door to the suite is at the far end of the hallway. Enjoy your stay with us, sirs!" 

Gaav headed for the stairs in a swirl of coat-skirts, and I had to take a couple of half-running steps to catch up with him. 

"Was that really a good idea?" I asked. "I mean, it didn't seem much like you were keeping a low profile to me!" 

He waved that away. "The low-profile thing's only with respect to other Mazoku. I don't care all that much about drawing human attention in ways that _don't_ suggest I'm Mazoku. Only Xellos would think to ask about something like that, and if he's on our tail we're probably fucked anyway." 

"You're actually scared of him?" I asked. 

"Only when I don't have him right in front of me. He's a dangerous strategist but a shitty tactician—he can't always manipulate people fast enough to deal with unforeseen circumstances, so if he can't set everything up in advance and his pawns are a bit slow on the uptake, he's fucked. When he's got all the time in the world he can sometimes get half a step ahead of me for a while, though, and that's when I worry." The Dark Lord paused to apply the key to the door at the end of the hall. It opened easily, and he stepped inside our suite. "Not bad," he said, looking around, moving aside so I could enter too. 

It was a lot more than "not bad". Okay, it wasn't a palace, but I'd seldom been in such luxurious surroundings. Fine furniture, thick carpet. Every wooden surface shone. Every fabric surface had the dull sheen of silk. There were paintings on the walls, good ones—or at least they looked good to me, but what I knew about art would fit in a thimble. The vase sitting in the middle of the polished table, holding an arrangement of fresh flowers, though, _that_ I could provide a valuation on. Not all that rare or valuable for an antique, but it would still have gone for two hundred gold at the Vase and Mace. For an incidental piece of decor that probably got broken at least once a year. I wasn't sure I was going to dare touch anything in here, much less sit in the chairs or sleep in one of the beds that had to lie behind the inner doors that stood invitingly ajar. 

I forced myself to move forward and flop down onto one of those chairs anyway. _Fake it until you make it._ I wasn't going to admit that I felt out of my depth here. The chair's padding sank at least an inch under my not-inconsiderable weight—my human form doesn't weigh as much as my dragon one does, but it's heavier than a true human of the same size—and yet the frame barely creaked. 

"Don't worry about trashing the place," Gaav said. "It isn't like either of us is ever going to come here again after this is over. We can afford not to care what the humans think." 

"Do you really expect to be here for three days?" was all I could think of to ask. 

"Hard to tell, since we're not sure yet what's going on. Don't fall asleep yet, we need to get downstairs . . . and you're the one who needs to eat actual physical food." 

"Which isn't fair," I said. It had taken a lot of courage to sit down in the first place, and I was going to enjoy it for a few moments more before getting back to work. 

"Who said anything about fair? And besides, little dragon, you wouldn't like it if I made it so you didn't need to eat. That kind of thing has consequences. You'll just have to wait a couple of centuries until your real body stops growing." When the hell had he come over to stand so close behind me? His hand just barely brushed the edge of my ear and the side of my neck, and I felt a hot-cold shiver run through me. Not painful, but very, very strange, and I wasn't sure whether I liked it or hated it. 

"What are you doing?" I snapped, with maybe more of an edge than I'd intended, because the hand jerked away. 

"Guess I got careless. C'mon, move that feathery black tail of yours, or I'll have to haul you _and_ the chair downstairs." 

"You wouldn't dare." 

"Try me." Even though he wasn't in my line of sight, I could see that damned smirk of his in my mind's eye. I snarled in exasperation and levered myself up out of the chair again. 

The area downstairs had a restaurant, a bar, and a cafe that hadn't been visible from the street because it overlooked the small garden at the back of the building. It was the one with the most customers at this comparatively early hour of the day, so that was where we ended up. If I hadn't been at least a little used to Gaav at that point, I would have been surprised at just how out of place he _didn't_ look seated among dainty white-painted tables. That obnoxious self-confidence made him comfortable in just about any surroundings. I was the one who always felt uncomfortable. 

We ate pizza, a surprising inclusion in the menu, and listened to the conversations around us. I didn't learn a damned thing that had to do with the inner part of the city, but maybe Gaav was having better luck. He certainly didn't seem interested in moving once we were done with the pizza. Instead he brought out the backgammon board and ordered more tea, and actually drank some of it for once while we played. It never got quite busy enough for the waitresses to ask us to move on, and we spent what might have been a pleasant enough afternoon in different company . . . because Gaav still always won nearly every damned game, and smirked about it. I didn't ask him to change games, though, because there was _some_ element of chance in this, without the game relying on our skills in reading each other. Playing just about anything else, from chess to poker, meant that I lost _every_ time. 

He finally packed up when the sun started sliding down over the rooftops. He didn't say anything of substance as he settled our tab with the waitresses and led the way back inside. 

Back in the suite, I sat down while he circled the main room three times with a scowl on his face, then turned abruptly to me. 

"So what did you get from all that?" he asked. 

"Other than the fact that you're unfairly good at just about every game there is?" I was tempted to leave it at that, but something in his expression drove me to take the question more seriously. "A lot of woman again. Dressed like merchants, not merchants' wives." I'd learned to tell the difference when I'd been hauled along to Filia's occasional business meetings as a hatchling. Woman merchants tended to wear less makeup and more conservative clothing—they wanted the people they were talking to thinking about the business they were trying to transact, not what they looked like. "And very few male merchants, or groups consisting only of males, except for the ones who left just before we did. Come to think of it, you stopped by their table for half a second. Why?" 

Gaav threw something. I thought for a moment it was a shuriken, but when instead of tearing the cushion of the chair beside me, it bounced off the back and fluttered down to rest on the seat, I realized it was . . . a brochure? 

I picked it up. Thick paper, sharp printing in multiple colours . . . someone had spent money on this. 

"Welcome to Troanna, City of Women," I read aloud. _You've got to be kidding me._ Then I unfolded it and read some more. _You have_ really _got to be kidding me._ The bit that jumped out at me most was, _Men are not permitted in Inner Troanna without a female escort. If you are male and your business requires you to go Inside, there are professional escorts available for hire. Their services can be used only from dawn to dusk, however, and you may be required to submit to certain conditions._ There was also the little gem, _The escort is for your own safety. Men who are not the property of a woman have no rights in Inner Troanna._

I tried to imagine Gaav putting up with some kind of . . . minder, because that was what the "escorts" presumably were. Even under the best of conditions, I couldn't see him tolerating it. And it would be difficult to look for the jar while we were towing an extra person along, and one we had to keep in the dark at that. 

"Maybe it's still in the outer city," I said. 

The Dark Lord shook his head. "Read the back." 

I flipped the paper over and skimmed it. Post offices . . . that couldn't be it. Security services . . . all-woman city guard . . . patrolling both the city itself and nearby areas to keep them clean of bandits and monsters . . . based inside the Inner City. Yeah, I could see the connections snapping together. The guard would have felt themselves responsible for handling the trolls, and if they'd done so, they had whatever goods had been in the trolls' possession. Which meant talking to one of their officers. 

"They've got to have some kind of presence in the outer city too," I pointed out. "We can ask about the trolls there. Hell, I might even be able to claim the jar—say that I was shipping it to Filia so that she could evaluate it or something, and the trolls might have caught the messenger. She runs a pottery shop, and she knows a lot about antique jars and vases." Although that felt too easy. "And if that doesn't work, I'm not dressing in drag to get inside that place! We can sneak in and steal it." 

"If we can figure out where to steal it from," Gaav pointed out. "But no, I wouldn't put you in a dress. You'd resent it too much, and the result would be fucking unconvincing. If we absolutely have to, there are better ways." His scowl suggested that he wouldn't be very happy about those "better ways" either, though. 

The front desk clerk was more than willing to provide us with directions to the main guard station in the outer city. It was a stiff walk, practically at the other end of town. When we got there, the guards at the doorway, a pair of well-built women in plate armour, both looked down their noses at us (tilting their heads back as necessary when confronted with Gaav's extreme height), but they didn't actually try to keep us from entering the building. 

I forced myself into the lead as we approached the counter in the center of the main room. I also tried to remember how to look priestly and harmless. They might even think Gaav was just my bodyguard, since I wasn't carrying a visible weapon. 

"Excuse me," I said, carefully controlling my tone of voice. _Humble and harmless, right._

The woman behind the counter, who looked like every senior sergeant of something-or-other everywhere, with close-cropped hair going grey at the temples and a weatherbeaten face, looked up. "Can I help you fellows with something?" 

"I sincerely hope so." Smile, yes, just like that. "A few months ago, I shipped something to a friend, hoping that she could evaluate it for its archaeological importance. Unfortunately, it never arrived, and I discovered just recently that the messenger may have been waylaid by a group of trolls living close to here . . ." 

"The highway patrol cleaned out a nest of trolls just a couple of days ago," the sergeant said. "They might have recovered your goods. You're going to have to hurry if you want them back, though—the auction's tonight." 

I blinked, still trying to look mild. "Auction?" 

She shrugged. "We can't afford to store recovered or confiscated goods indefinitely, so anything that isn't illegal or part of an ongoing investigation is auctioned off on a monthly basis. The first auction takes place in the Inner City tonight, and then the run-off auction will be out here tomorrow." 

It took a lot of effort to keep looking mild, pleasant, and harmless. "What do I need to do if I want to reclaim what I shipped before then?" 

"Present some kind of proof of ownership to our main offices in the Inner City. If you don't have an escort, I can recommend one . . . I assume you do understand the system here?" 

"I do. Thank you for your time. I'll be making my own arrangements for an escort." I inclined my head. 

"And thank _you_ for not wasting my time on bluster and threats," the sergeant said, with a hint of a smile. "Have a pleasant evening, gentlemen." 

I led the way out of the building with a measured stride, walked about a block, and turned sharply into an alleyway. Only then did I let my meek exterior drop. 

"Well, that's just _perfect_ ," I growled, and punched a wall. Or tried to. Gaav caught my hand before I could knock any buildings down. So I punched _him_ , and got a grunt and a set of bruised knuckles. 

"Actually, it isn't as bad as it could be," the Dark Lord said. "We've got a chance of getting our hands on the fucking jar without having to steal it or otherwise draw attention. We just have to get to the auction." 

"Assuming they didn't throw it out as trash." 

Gaav snorted. "Not likely. Little places for this are always strapped for cash. They'll at least try to sell it." 

"So what do we do now? Hire an escort?" 

"No, I don't want anyone else sticking their noses into our business." He scowled, then added, "I don't think we have time to go back to the inn. Fuck. Wait a moment." 

He stripped off his sword harness, then his long coat, dumping them into a fold in space. He looked down at his hands, still scowling, then shook his head and made a slight gesture. 

His entire body became a cloud of darkness studded with sparks of red, eyes glowing out of the mass like pools of blood. The cloud adjusted itself slowly, but I couldn't tell what he was doing until the blackness solidified again, to reveal . . . quite a different form from the one I'd grown accustomed to. 

Still tall and muscular, but not so overwhelmingly so. Generous curves at breast and hip. Face softer, without those ridiculous bushy eyebrows, and less tanned. Hands narrower, but still strong. But the scowl was still the same as she? He? _He,_ I decided. Even in this shape, there was something about Gaav that struck me as fundamentally male. Regardless, he kind of shimmied his entire body, then checked his hair, which had been twisted up and pinned in place, with the end cascading down his back. The black dress that completed the picture was sleeveless and high-collared, mid-calf-length, tightly fitted through the bodice, and slit to show a flash of thigh on either side. There was some kind of subtle black-on-black embroidery too, but I couldn't make out the pattern. A pair of embroidered cloth shoes and a chunky gold bracelet on his left wrist completed the effect. 

"This always feels like I'm wearing something about half a size too small, but it should do for now." He was a contralto now—I don't know why that startled me. There was no way he would make a convincing woman speaking in his usual bass tones. 

"You look . . ." My voice trailed off again, because I was damned if I knew what to say. _Different. Wrong. Uncomfortable._ "I didn't know you could do that." 

"A Mazoku's astral projection can be any shape imaginable." Gaav shook his head. "I'm a little more limited than I used to be these days because what I put together has to work biologically, but I still have a lot of options. It's just that this one doesn't _feel_ right. I don't understand how the others can be so comfortable with swapping back and forth." 

I was still trying to internalize what this _meant_ , with a side order of wondering why I cared. Okay, so Mazoku shapeshifting wasn't like dragon shapeshifting. Was that really so surprising? Or had some part of me parsed Gaav as a dragon, internalizing him as something that he really wasn't? 

"You're going to be all right?" snuck out of my mouth, making me want to choke myself. 

Gaav smiled, and odd, wry expression that didn't at all match his usual grin. "This isn't damaging, little dragon. Just an annoying form of playacting. Now, we'd better get to one of the Inner City gates. We're going to want plenty of time to scope out the auction site, just in case." 

He set off with his usual no-nonsense stride, but stopped after a couple of steps, scowled, and then set off again with slightly shorter strides and a sway to his hips. I shook my head. Was this really going to work? Gaav's body might be female for the time being, but his body _language_ struck me as profoundly off. Or was that only because I knew? 

"It isn't playacting to the other Mazoku, is it?" I said suddenly. "They're . . . um . . ." I waved my hands, once again at a loss for words. 

«It's complicated.» The reply had to be in my head, since I heard it as bass and not contralto. «Ruby-Eye is technically neuter. So are a lot of Mazoku—for instance, Phibby's projections never had anything between the legs. Since he liked to manifest as a little kid, it didn't matter most of the time anyway. Those of us strong enough to create a projection that can pass for human tend to select male or female based on the social role we intend to adopt. For me, that was pretty much always male, and maybe it burned in somehow. Or maybe there was always something in me that was . . . biased in that direction. I do know it feels much worse this time than it used to, but this is also the first time I've tried to manifest this way since the Shinma War, so I may just be out of practice. So, to answer your question: it's all playacting, and at the same time none of it is.» 

Which was something else that had to be chewed over slowly in order to make it comprehensible, but there was no time for that right now, because we were coming up on one of the inner gates. 

This time, Gaav wasn't shy about joining the line. I waited quietly beside him with my eyes fixed on the ground and the irrational feeling that everyone was staring at us. I gritted my teeth and endured, expecting every moment that someone would point and yell, "Hey! That's an impostor!" 

It was stupid, of course. Hell, if they stripped Gaav down just now, I was sure he'd have breasts and all other applicable parts. It was just that standing there doing nothing gave me time to let my mind wander. 

By the time we got to the head of the line, I was starting to think this was going to work after all. 

"Returning home, ma'am?" asked the guard on the left. "And this is your dependent?" 

"That's right," Gaav said, with a smile not at all like his usual. 

"Fine. Let me just check . . . Where's his collar?" 

The scales at the back of my neck hackled, and I tensed to run. 

«Calm down,» said Gaav's voice in my head. And then, out loud, "Val, don't tell me you took it off again?" 

Oh. Maybe we could salvage this after all. "And dropped it down a storm drain," I said with a pout that hopefully didn't look too forced. "You know I hate that thing." 

Gaav sighed. "I swear, sometimes you act like a child. I don't suppose I can convince you to overlook it just this once?" he added to the guard, who frowned. 

"We do have temporary collars, but you'll have to fill out a form, and there's a fine . . . I really hope he's good in bed, if he's always this much trouble." 

Gaav frowned too, but he handed over the twenty silvers meekly enough, and took the form and the pen the guard gave him. She nodded to the other guard, who ducked through the gate for a moment and came back with a strip of leather about a foot and a half long, with a buckle in it. A literal damned collar, the kind you would put on a dog. 

I looked at it. At the guard. At Gaav. They couldn't seriously mean I was supposed to _wear_ that, could they? Even though I knew it was just playacting, I couldn't bring myself to reach out and take it. My wrists throbbed under their bandages, and a slow, simmering rage began to build in my chest. 

_Like hell I will,_ I thought, baring my teeth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Inspired by every Episode 17 Slayers has ever produced (but especially the one from Next). Alas, I couldn't make things work out for it to be chapter 17.


	14. Chapter 13

" _Val._ " Gaav's physical voice overlapped with his mental one. «I'm sorry, little dragon. I can replace it with an illusion once we're inside, but it's difficult to do while she's staring straight at us. Will you feel better if I help you feed it to her on the way out?» 

I growled. I also lowered my arms and lifted my chin. «Get it on me quick before I lose my temper,» I told Gaav silently. 

It seemed like my temper had been getting worse and worse lately. I was starting to wonder how I'd ever managed to convince anyone that I might have a vocation. Or maybe Gaav was rubbing off on me. Maybe that was what it meant to be a Dark Lord's Priest. 

Thinking about that was better than thinking about the sensation of the leather being wrapped around my neck. Gaav fastened the buckle snugly enough to make it look tight, but not to impede my breathing or anything like that. But there was no way I could ignore it was there, marking me out. 

_Just a costume,_ I told myself, gritting my teeth. _It doesn't really mean that you're property. Well, not any more than you were already._ Damn Gaav and his little, "you swore yourself to me" speech. And damn me, that I could feel myself falling under his spell. 

It was getting harder and harder to remember that I should hate him. Harder and harder to remember he was evil. 

Once they had the collar on me, the guards were happy enough to let us through the gates, although one of them did throw an off-colour remark in my direction. I ignored it, fixing my eyes firmly on Gaav's back. 

He waited until we would have merged into the general flow of traffic as visible from the gate before drawing me into the doorway of a shop already closed for the evening. "Are you alright, little dragon?" 

"Pissed off and trying to remind myself that this is just a costume and I can take it off in a few hours," I replied. "I'll live." 

"Good. Just a sec, though." He reached toward the collar again, and I felt the leather writhe against my throat for a moment and . . . become metal? "Wouldn't want people to believe I value you so little I'd make you wear that piece of shit." 

I couldn't see it, obviously, but when I touched it, my fingers found metal studded with gems, and lightly padded with velvet on the inside for my comfort. 

"I'm not sure whether I should be flattered or really, really scared," I muttered, and Gaav chuckled. 

"Make up your mind later—right now, we've got an auction to crash." 

Fortunately, we didn't have to ask any passers-by for directions. Someone had put up signs announcing the auction, with arrows pointing to the venue. As we got closer, we started to see more people on the streets: women, mostly, in pairs or threesomes, sometimes with men. None of the men didn't have a woman with him, and all of them wore collars—most of them more like the leather strip we'd been given at the gate than what I was wearing now, although I did notice a few fancier models. I was a bit surprised to notice some people shooting envious looks at us, but, well, Gaav had a lot of _presence_ even in a form that didn't quite fit him, and I must look like a well-cared-for pet even in my worn travelling clothes. I scowled and went back to staring at Gaav's back, and the slow sway of blood red hair against that black dress. 

The auction house was a big block of a building that took up one entire side of a square, rising a full three stories above the pavement. The sun had dipped pretty far down by the time we got there, but light spilled welcomingly through the open doors. 

Gaav strode up the three shallow steps outside those doors and nodded cordially at the guards flanking them. Both of them nodded back. 

Inside was a marble-lined lobby, where we looked both more and less out-of-place than I'd felt we looked in the street: less because there were a number of women here who were wearing jewelry just as visibly expensive as Gaav's chunky bracelet, and more because they were mostly older and all lacked both his sense of style (fashions in the area seemed to currently be running to hoop skirts and ruffles) and his attitude. There were fewer men in here, and most wore fancy collars—metal like mine, or dyed and embroidered suede—and rather revealing clothing. They also tended to be either very pretty or well-developed and muscular. The looks we got were more speculative than admiring. 

"Ma'am?" A guard, in uniform but unarmed, had quietly approached us. "Do you have an invitation?" 

Gaav shook his head. "No, I wasn't supposed to be back in time for this. Is that a problem?" 

"Of course not, but you will have to pay the entry fee. Ten gold for yourself and two for your companion." 

The Dark Lord raised his eyebrows, which would have looked a lot more impressive if they'd been their normal shaggy selves, then reached behind himself and pulled out a small leather bag (created from nothing on the spot, but I was the only one who could see that), from which he counted out the money. 

The guard bowed to us and handed him a rectangle of stiff, cream-coloured card. "Thank you, ma'am. Please enjoy your evening, and thank you for supporting the City Guard." 

Gaav examined the bit of card as she moved away, and the corner of his mouth turned up. «Well, she did a pretty fucking good job of taking us for a ride,» his internal voice murmured, and he tilted the card so that I could see it. _VIP Contributor,_ I read, and snorted. 

«I'm surprised you're not pissed off.» 

«I can afford to be amused at mortal foibles,» Gaav replied. «And besides, do you have any idea how much fucking money I have? Neither do I. I've got a good half-dozen pocket dimensions full of that shit, since it comes in handy sometimes. Some of it I haven't touched in thousands of years. I don't care if they take a few pieces. Or if you do either, for that matter.» 

«You keep trying to give me money.» What the hell was I even trying to say? I wasn't sure. 

«I just want you to be able to focus on what's important without worrying about that mortal shit.» 

«I _am_ mortal,» I pointed out. Dragons do live a long time, but we still have a finite lifespan. 

«Less so than you think, maybe.» 

What the hell? Was that supposed to be ominous, or just cryptic? Gaav wasn't looking at me, so I couldn't tell. Hell, it wasn't even the first time he'd said something like that. 

"The auction will begin in ten minutes!" announced a guard with gold braid on her uniform—an officer, I guess. 

"Let's find somewhere to sit," Gaav said out loud, putting his hand on my shoulder and beginning to steer me toward the inner doors. 

The seating area inside angled steeply downward to make certain the auctioneer could see everyone, and as you went lower, the seats went from unpadded wooden benches to a thin layer of hard-wearing fabric over straw to velvet and thick padding to a series of semi-booths with low tables and refreshments laid out, right against the stage. 

Gaav sauntered calmly down to the very bottom and picked a boothlet off to one side. No one challenged him, even when he gestured for me to sit beside him. The only two other men I could see at this level were both kneeling on cushions on the floor, with their eyes downcast. 

"I'm starting to think there's a law around here that says guys can't wear real shirts," I muttered. "Except that if there was, we'd have been arrested by now." I was the only male anywhere in the room who had fabric covering both arms and my navel. Hell, if my travel clothes hadn't been so shabby, I might have started to feel overdressed. 

"I considered doing something about your outfit when I twiddled the collar, but I didn't figure it was worth arguing with you about it." Gaav flashed me a grin, subtly different from his usual one, but just as smug. "If anyone asks, I can always claim I prefer to keep you to myself." 

"Shut up before I throw something at you." The stuff laid out on the table offered some interesting possibilities. Like that cheese ball, for instance. 

The grin wasn't so smug anymore. More like . . . reminiscent. "You never change, do you?" 

So the old me had been prone to saying stuff like that? To him? No wonder he barely batted an eyelash when I chewed him out. 

"If I didn't know better, I'd think you had a masochistic streak," I muttered. Gaav made an odd kind of noise, a smothered _hrphm_. Inside, he was laughing. 

Up on the stage, or whatever you wanted to call it, someone had stepped up to the podium. "Thank you for coming tonight, ladies." A woman's voice, of course. "The 358th monthly auction of the Troanna City Guard is about to begin. Thanks to the contributions of two bandit gangs and a den of trolls, we have nearly fifty lots tonight, including several magical items. Please enjoy the show." 

I looked up in time to see two "attendants"—men dressed in silk shorts and sandals, bodies glistening with oil to emphasise muscles that weren't half as impressive as Gaav's were in his usual form—carry out the first "lot", which turned out to be a chest full of china, mostly tea services. I doubted the trolls had kept that, so it had to have come from a merchant via one of the bandit gangs. And the bandits hadn't known much about tea services. I didn't even have to examine these closely to be able to tell they were mass-produced blue-and-white-ware from Alto, which was so worthless Filia wouldn't stock it in her shop. 

More lots followed: fabric, horse harness, camping gear. Three jars of perfume that were auctioned one at a time. A keg of nails. Ten pounds of blue glass beads, assorted sizes and shapes. Two dozen swords, low-quality and some visibly rusty, sold together in a bundle. No jars, and no other magical items either, anywhere in the first forty-three lots. 

I was glad I hadn't thrown the cheeseball at Gaav. Trying to figure out exactly what the caterers had put into it kept me occupied while we waited. 

Then the auctioneer said, "Lot forty-four," and Gaav suddenly, subtly came alert. 

It only took one attendant to bring it out, and it really was the ugliest jar I had ever seen. A bit larger than my two fists, made of crude earthenware, with patterns pressed into it by someone's fingers. The irregularities were visible even though it never got closer to me than ten feet. There was some kind of stone set just below the lip of the jar, and from time to time it caught enough light to rouse a baleful flicker of red from somewhere in its depths. 

«Fuck, that's old,» Gaav said along the link between us. «Early Shinma War era, from when humans wore animal skins and lived in caves. What's your bet it was just left out in the sun to dry without being fired?» 

«I don't care how old it is,» I replied. «The question is, is it the right jar?» 

«Can't you feel it?» 

It wasn't until he asked that I realized that I did feel . . . something. Like a breath of cold, stinking air, stirring my scales and making them hackle. «Ugh.» 

«It isn't trying to hide,» Gaav stated. «It's probably looking for a new . . . host, pawn, whatever you want to call it. Not many likely candidates here to _my_ mind, but I don't know exactly what it's trying to do.» 

«Does it know we're here?» 

«Maybe, but there isn't much it can do about it even if it does. Without any pawns, it's just a fucking ugly lump of clay.» 

That should have been reassuring, I guess. It wasn't. 

" . . . It's a fine work of primitive art, ladies, with undoubted archaeological significance," the auctioneer was saying. "And the mysterious spell on it should be of interest to any sorceress." 

The audience didn't look like they were buying it, in either sense. The auctioneer was not looking happy. 

"We'll start the bidding at ten silver," she said. 

A hand whipped up, somewhere back in the cheap seats. The owner was wearing a long robe—probably a sorceress or priestess. 

"Ten! Do we have eleven . . . eleven . . ." 

Gaav, frowning, held up his hand. I doubted it was the money that was bothering him—more likely the possibility that we were drawing attention. Bidding was a normal thing to do at an auction, but bidding on a jar that looked like that . . . _We can always tell someone we lost a bet._

I tuned out the auctioneer's chant and instead turned to get a better view of the bank of seats above us. The sorceress was raising her hand again. I made a mental note of her appearance—green robes, blonde hair braided in pigtails, round face, spray of freckles across her nose and cheeks—just in case. 

The bidding went up to sixteen silver, one coin at a time, before Gaav, impatient, flashed five fingers when he raised his hand and sent it straight to twenty-one. The sorceress chewed on her lower lip for a moment, reaching down to touch something out of my line of sight—her purse?—before beginning to shake her head. Then she got the oddest expression on her face, and raised her hand. 

"Wind Brid!" 

It was so utterly unexpected that no one had time to do anything, not even Gaav. The spell, weak though it was, slammed into the jar and knocked it flying. It bounced off the corner of the auctioneer's podium, knocking the lid askew, and began to fountain black murk as it hit the floor and spun around. 

" _Shit,_ " Gaav snarled, somehow managing to make the word sound even worse in his current voice. He surged to his feet and . . . snatched a hairpin from his hair. Looking at the redly-glowing six-inch blade it revealed when pulled loose, I could see why. "Val, get that sorceress. I want to know what she thought she was doing. I'll handle this." The hairpin lengthened into a full sword with a blade of translucent red light as he leaped up onto the stage, providing quite a view through his dress' side slits. 

I looked for the sorceress, found her in the orderly queue of people headed for the exit—hadn't those guards realized what she'd been doing?! I sprang to the back of the nearest seat and began to hurdle over the rows, climbing up the side of the room without having to get involved in the crush between the seats . . . missed a leap and almost fell as an old woman stood up from where she must have been bent over gathering up her cane. I must have looked like an insane dancer as I fought to check my momentum and catch my balance without letting my wings pop out, even though they would have made it much easier. We were going to have enough to explain without offering clear proof to everyone in the room that we weren't what we seemed. 

"Hey, you! What are you—?!" 

"This isn't a good time," I snapped as a guard began to work her way toward me. The sorceress was— 

"Dark Mist!" 

I snarled a word in reply—a half-forgotten word in the language of dragons, which was meant to be snarled in tones like those. I couldn't even remember where I'd learned it, since Filia didn't swear. But it seemed like the most appropriate thing to say as black fog spread through the room and cut off my view of my target. 

«Val! Get away from there! Get away from there _now_!» Gaav's voice snapped inside my head—and just where the hell did he think I was going to go when I could barely see my hand in front of my face? In the end, all I could do was drop down behind the seat whose back I'd been balancing on. I made it barely in time, because I not only felt something whizz by, but I felt the gentlest of tugs on my hair and a tickle against my cheek as loose hair-ends sifted down. 

_Screw this,_ I thought. "Bomb Di Wind!" It was the strongest air shamanistic spell I knew, and it forced the black fog out through doors and windows and cracks in the walls. It also knocked over a lot of people, sent loose objects flying through the air, and damaged some of the seating. But at least I could see. I picked myself up and looked around for that damnable sorceress. 

I found her almost right away, lying facedown on an otherwise vacant section of aisle. She wasn't moving, and when I fought my way through the mess to turn her over, I discovered she was dead, with a dagger jammed up into her chest at an angle that said it must have pierced the heart. I pulled it out and tried casting Resurrection anyway, but it was no use. She was gone, taking her secrets with her. 

Down on the stage, Gaav was still fighting, the glowing red sword making sizzling sounds as it bit into a dark, humanoid figure that seemed to be composed of semi-solid astral energy or something. It wasn't as clear as Xellos' body had always been when he'd dropped by to torment Filia, but there was something really ominous about it. 

There was a perfectly timed dual _shching_ nearby, and I felt cold metal against either side of my neck. "Don't move," said an ominous female voice. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see what looked like a trouser leg from a city guard's uniform, which would be unsurprising, here. 

I froze obediently, biting down hard on my tongue to keep from saying what I was thinking. This was _not_ the time to cause a disturbance and distract Gaav. 

Not that my attempts to avoid that ended up mattering anyway. The cloudy figure slashed at Gaav with one hand while stretching the other out to point in my direction. Purple lightning crackled, Gaav glanced briefly in my direction, snarled " _Fuck!_ " with both his voices overlapping, and stepped between me and the enemy. As though he did it all the time. The purple lightning crackled down his sword and along his arm, and he was thrown back into the nearest row of seats, which crunched under his weight. He bounced back up again almost instantly, but it was already too late. The dark figure had turned itself into a stream of darkness and fled through a window. 

Gaav stared after it with a scowl that, once again, needed his male face's bushy eyebrows to come across as really impressive. The blade of the glowing sword he'd been wielding vanished once again, leaving him with a stiletto-like hairpin, which he flipped over with a twist of his wrist and stuck back into his hair. He turned and began to climb the aisle to where two of the guards were holding their short swords against the sides of my neck, his expression still ominous. 

He came to a stop just inside his arm's length from me. "Val? Are you okay?" 

"Pissed off, but not hurt," I said. "You?" He had an ugly red mark along his arm, but it wasn't blistered or anything. It might have been a really bad sunburn, if it hadn't been so localized. And his dress wasn't damaged at all. 

"Just a scratch. And her?" He gestured at the sorceress' dead body, still stretched out on the floor in front of me. 

I instinctively began to shake my head, then stopped again as I felt sharp steel start to bite into my skin. "Dead. I tried to revive her, but either I wasn't quick enough or I'm just not good enough." 

If anything, his scowl deepened. "That's all we need. And you were interrupted before you could check the body, I'd bet." His eyes raked over the guards on either side of me. "Ease up," he told them. "We're not going anywhere." 

Well, the two women did lift their blades away from my neck by about an inch. That helped. 

"We're not empowered to release him, ma'am," one of them said. "We'll have to wait for an officer. You're both—pardon me—extremely suspicious." 

I snorted. _Yeah, I'll just bet we are!_

"Fine, we'll wait. But let Val up." I wondered if the two guards realized their lives had been saved by Gaav's "low profile" policy. I doubted he would have had any compunctions about mulching them if he hadn't been trying to hide—or was I being unfair to him again? 

The guards backed off a little bit, and I rose from my crouch beside the body. I went over to stand beside the Dark Lord, because I thought that was what they'd probably be expecting. I was a bit startled when he put his arm around me, but I did my best to hide it. All part of the act, right. 

«I'm surprised you're not teleporting us out,» I said silently. 

«I considered it, but the quickest way to find out about this fucking stupid sorceress may be to coax it out of the guards. They'll probably be able to find out where she was living and stuff like that a lot quicker than the two of us could. It's one of those things that needs minions or contacts, not brains or combat capability, and we're really short on both right now.» 

«We're a little short on coaxing ability too,» I pointed out. 

«Bribes and threats are also available options, but you have to pick the right moment to use them, and I haven't seen any good ones yet.» 

There was some noise up near the doors—complaints, raised voices overlapping until it was impossible to make out what anyone was saying—although pretty much everyone had long since evacuated the room. After that had been going on for a bit, a guard with gold inlay on her armour came down the stairs. She was fortyish, at a guess, and short, but muscular enough that the armour didn't look out of place. Her blonde hair was beginning to silver, and unlike most of the other guards, she wore it long, in a tight braid that fell to the middle of her back. She had a squarish jaw, and at some point something had taken a wedge out of her left ear. Like Gaav in his female form, she wasn't conventionally pretty, but she had a lot of presence. At her hip, she wore a longsword in a shabby scabbard that looked odd against the parade armour. 

"Report," she said in a firm voice, and I swallowed a laugh as I realized the soles of her boots had to be two inches thick. Without them, the top of her head wouldn't have reached my chin. 

"Um," said one of the guards. 

The other one, who had spoken to Gaav squared her shoulders. "The bidding on Lot 44—I don't know if you remember, ma'am, but it was an ugly magic jar—was just winding up when a spell was fired from the audience. It knocked the jar to the ground and the lid came off. Something started coming out of the jar, and after that things became . . . confused. We started to evacuate the hall. That lady over there—" The guard pointed at Gaav. "—took on the thing from the jar with a magic sword, and her companion came leaping up over the seat backs, apparently trying to get to this person, who had already collapsed." She pointed at the sorceress' body. "He rolled her over, pulled a dagger out of her chest, and attempted to cast some kind of spell on the body. We took him into custody then. I missed what was going on down below at that point, but when I had the time to look again, the thing from the jar was gone." 

"And have you been able to find out the _why_ of any of this?" the officer asked. 

"No, ma'am. I figured we should wait for you, or at least the sergeant or the lieutenant, before trying to question anyone." 

The officer sighed. "Fine. Let's move this out of this cave and into one of the rooms they use for private transactions—if you don't mind, that is, ma'am and sir," she added, nodding to us. Gaav shrugged agreement. "You're with us," she added, pointing at the silent guard. "You get someone in here to look over the body." That was the talkative guard. 

"Yes, ma'am!" 

"Follow me," the officer added to us, and began to lead the way back up the way she'd come. The silent guard positioned herself behind us—as insurance, no doubt. 

We ended up in a small, plush sitting room. Gaav selected a velvet-upholstered couch and sat down without being invited, using the arm he still had wrapped around me to pull me with him. The officer blew a sigh and remained standing. 

"I'm Shanya Difrost, commander of the Troanna City Guard," she said. "And you?" 

"Gala Rufous," Gaav lied easily. "And this is Val Ul Copt." 

"Hmm," Commander Shanya said. "And . . . what exactly is going on here?"


	15. Chapter 14

Gaav raised his eyebrows. "Well, I'll do my best to explain, but there are some things I don't know either. Let's start with the jar. As I understand it, it has something to do with Hellmaster Phibrizzo. I don't know exactly what, but we were told in no uncertain terms not to let anyone open it." 

"Told by whom?" Commander Shanya asked. 

Gaav shrugged. "The _individual_ who hired us to find it." 

"And that person was?" the guard commander asked in a very dry tone of voice. 

"A fairly high-level Mazoku who works for the Beastmaster. According to him, the other Mazoku didn't like Hellmaster very much either. They're quite happy he's gone, and they'd prefer that any lingering plots of his disappear quietly. And this is one of the Mazoku who refuses to lie outright." 

Shanya looked like she wanted to sit down. Hell, she looked like she wanted a bottle of brandy. "So you thought that retrieving something belonging to a Dark Lord and giving it to another Mazoku was a good idea." 

"Hell, no!" There was a slight twitch at the corner of Gaav's mouth as he bit back his habitual _fuck_ , and I hid a smile behind my hand. "I was pretty sure from the start that it wasn't just a jar. More likely a portal to who-knows-where, or some kind of black magic generator. Or a prison. When I asked, the Mazoku said destroying it without breaking the seal on the lid was safe and wouldn't let loose whatever was inside. Our commission was to destroy it, hide it, or otherwise make sure it wasn't going to get opened." 

"We were thinking of taking it to the Outer World and having it incorporated into the foundation slab for some kind of building if it got stubborn about breaking," I added helpfully. "Having it encased in concrete would keep it under control for at least a few decades—maybe even forever." 

"Hmm. And the sorceress?" 

"No clue," Gaav said, spreading his hands in a gesture that wasn't quite a shrug. "We'd never seen or heard of her before tonight. In fact, we were hoping you would know something." 

"Then why was your companion casting spells on her corpse?" 

I barely kept from rolling my eyes. "Like I said before, I was trying to revive her. I've got some training in white magic. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough this time." 

"So she was dead when you rolled her over." 

"I assumed so, although it's possible she might still have been in the process of dying. Given the dagger sticking out of her chest, I didn't think I should waste time on checking her pulse and breathing." 

Commander Shanya gave me a sharp look, and I reminded myself not to be too snide. "Which leaves us with the question of who stabbed her." 

"Again, no clue," Gaav said. "Unless you saw something," he added to me. 

I shook my head. "I wasn't paying any attention to the people around her, but whoever it was has to have been right next to her when she cast Dark Mist, because there wasn't much time between that and my casting Bomb di Wind." 

"Or it was self-inflicted," Gaav said. «Or an accident,» he added inside my head. «Your spell knocked quite a few people off their feet, and if she had the knife in her hand and came down just the wrong way . . . I don't want anyone else thinking in that direction, though. The last thing we need is to have to fight off some kind of stupid manslaughter charge.» 

The thought should have made me feel sick. I didn't understand why it didn't. But when confronted with the thought, _I might have killed someone_ , something else inside me answered back, _so what?_

_Humans die,_ said Gaav's voice in my memory. _All the time._ I hadn't wanted to internalize that, but it seemed to be happening anyway. Or maybe the me he had once known had already believed it. 

"Suicide . . ." the guard captain was saying. 

"I know it seems a bit ridiculous on the face of it, but it's also absolute insurance against anyone making her talk," Gaav pointed out. "I'm pretty sure this was premeditated on someone's part. I've never seen anything quite this weird happen on the spur of the moment." 

"So what will you do now that you've apparently failed your commission?" 

"Track down whatever was inside that thing and deal with it," Gaav said promptly. "It's the only way we can salvage anything from this. Defaulting to a Mazoku on a bargain is never safe, and the one we dealt with has a reputation for being . . . unpleasantly creative." He hesitated—artfully, I thought—then added, "So I'd appreciate it if you could tell us anything you find out about the sorceress. It might end up saving our lives." 

Commander Shanya snorted. "Maybe you shouldn't have made that bargain in the first place." 

Gaav spread his hands in that unshrug again. "We need to eat, and this was going to pay well." 

"Adventurers," the guardswoman said sourly, but then she added, "All right. We'll pass on the results of our preliminary investigation to you, within reason. How can we contact you?" 

"We're staying at an inn in the outer city called The Stationary Caravan, along with my brother," Gaav said. 

"You're not going to be able to get back there tonight," Shanya said. "The gates are already closed." 

"I suppose my brother's going to have to spend tonight alone, then. Any recommendations for places to sleep in the inner city?" 

Shanya smiled, but not with a lot of humour in it. "The Tipping Goblet. It's right beside the main guard headquarters, and I want to be able to keep an eye on you two." 

It seemed like a nice enough inn, although I didn't get to see much of the lobby. Commander Shanya had sent ahead to arrange a room for us. And it was just one room. With one bed. I forced myself not to hesitate in the doorway or give any other sign that this was unusual. 

Gaav closed the door firmly behind us, and glanced around. «Nice eavesdropping setup they've got,» he observed inside my head. «A whole booth behind the left-hand wall. I think the holes are worked into that ugly still-life painting.» 

"So what now?" I asked out loud. 

"Now? We get some rest. We'll start looking for that thing in the morning. And hope it hasn't gotten all the way to fucking Baritone in the meanwhile." 

I scowled and looked at the bed. Sighed. "Do you think that's likely?" I asked, to cover for what I was actually thinking. 

"Depends on how scared it is. We'll hope it hasn't gone too far." He added inside my head, «What was inside the jar really was a piece of Phibby. Just a piece, though—it's incomplete and probably won't survive for long on its own. Which means it's either headed at high speed for the largest chunk of negative emotional energy it can find nearby, or possessing someone. I'd bet on the former—Phibby never did have much respect for corporeal beings.» He smirked before continuing, «It scared the shit out of him when he recognized me . . . and I could not only tell, I was able to feed off his fear. Which means he's a lot weaker than me right now. My bet is that this is something he set up as insurance after I ran into him in Dragon Valley, but before he finished his business with Lina Inverse. So if we don't catch him here, he'll probably head for Sairaag to see if he can find out what happened to the rest of him.» 

My geographical knowledge of the northern peninsula was spotty, but I was pretty sure Sairaag was at the other end. Which meant it was going to be a couple of months before I got the Dark Lord out of my hair, but at least there was an end in sight. 

"Fine," I grumbled aloud. "I suppose staying up won't make morning get here any faster." And I forced myself to toe off my boots and start taking off my shirt. 

Gaav began taking his hair down, one pin at a time. He kept his eyes on me as he did it, and although I tried to ignore him, I felt a slow flush creeping over my face. There were two long pins and two shorter ones, and I heard each one individually click against the surface of the desk beside the door as he set them aside. 

«Don't worry, little dragon,» he said in my head as he ran his hands through the long, red locks. «I won't ravish you in your sleep. Unless you want me to, that is.» 

" _Glk,_ " I said, and turned so that my back was to him. «No thank you. I prefer women who're shorter than I am.» 

It was a lie. Sort of. I'd never much thought about what kind of female might attract me. I did know that I'd never had any sexual interest in human women, though. Or human men, for that matter. They didn't have . . . I didn't know what. Something I couldn't put my finger on, exactly. Pheromones? Body language? Aura? All I knew was that it wasn't there. So I'd dated a couple of times, but I'd never been in a serious relationship, and never lost my virginity. The one time I'd tried, I hadn't been able to get it up, and all I'd accomplished was giving the nasty little voice in my head another hurtful line to use when it wanted to drain away what little optimism I possessed. 

In a way, Gaav was the most . . . sexually disconcerting person . . . I had ever met. Or at least, no one else had ever made me blush like that just by looking at me. Maybe it was because he was also the most . . . dragonish . . . person I had ever known, other than Filia. 

Oh, hell, I couldn't be developing _those_ kinds of feelings for him, could I? But if I was, how would I even recognize them? 

What the hell kind of relationship had the old me had with him, anyway? 

_I'm just screwed up because he looks like a woman right now,_ I told myself. I braced myself, dropped my trousers, and turned back to face him . . . only to discover that he was leaning, quite naked, against a bedpost, with his fake body on display. I swallowed, because I was definitely feeling . . . an unexpected stirring. And Gaav was clearly aware of it, because he was watching me intently, with that familiar smirk on his face. 

But all he said was, "Come to bed, Val." And he bent down to turn back a corner of the bedcovers invitingly. 

"You go ahead—I'll get the lights," I said, feeling the heat of my blush coming back. 

His chuckle followed me to the oil lamp by the door. He really seemed to enjoy teasing me, the bastard. 

By the time I'd gotten that lamp put out, he was lying in bed with his back to the empty half of the mattress. Giving me space. He always showed me consideration when it was important. It was one of the things that made travelling with him tolerable. 

I fell asleep with my back to him. I woke up in a tangle of limbs, with my face buried between his breasts. When I tried to wiggle free, he just wrapped his arms around me and squeezed. 

"Mmm . . . Val . . ." 

I kicked him in the ankle as hard as I could. "You're smothering me," I growled. "And stop pretending that you aren't awake." 

He chuckled and let go, rolling over onto his back. I told myself that I didn't miss the faint scent of dragon musk that clung to his skin. "Can't put one over on you, can I? So are you ready to face another day in Troanna?" 

I growled again, wordlessly, and touched my collar. I'd almost forgotten it in the scramble last night, but his words had just reminded me that it was there. "Do I have a choice?" 

"'Fraid not, but I promise it won't be much longer. If we don't turn up anything useful today, we'll head out tomorrow." 

For Sairaag, presumably. And once we got there, and dealt with Hellmaster, we'd then take the time to track down Sylphiel, or some other priest or priestess, and petition the gods for help in severing the bond between us. And I'd be free to go my own way—free, finally, of the guilt that had haunted me ever since I'd been a hatchling. Free . . . 

I felt my gaze sneaking toward Gaav, who had his dress back on and was repinning his hair. Was I going to miss him? _Just a little,_ I told myself. _Just a little._ Because he'd been good to me the whole time I'd been associating with him. He felt affection for me. He worried about me. And I . . . all right, admit it. I was a little worried about what would happen to him after we parted ways. Not just because he was being targeted by potentially all of the other Dark Lords _and_ all of the Dragon Gods, but because he had immense power and relatively little conscience. 

_I am not seriously thinking about staying with him afterwards to keep an eye on him!_

"What's wrong?" 

"Just wondering when the hell I'm going to have a chance to get a bath and put on some clean clothes," I grumbled. "These are filthy. They're even starting to stink." 

"When we get back to the other inn." 

«I'd be tempted to ask you to conjure me some up, except for what that would do to our cover,» I added silently, as I contemplated my shirt, so stiff with sweat that I was surprised it couldn't stand up on its own. I didn't have any choice but to put it on, though. 

«Anything for you, little dragon . . . but I admit that I want to see if they've learned anything about the sorceress first.» 

I finished buttoning the shirt, breathing through my mouth. "Fine. Let's go." 

We'd passed the guard headquarters the previous night on the way here. The guards outside didn't say anything as we breezed past them. In fact, they even looked at Gaav with something that might have been respect. Maybe it was because he'd fought off a Mazoku with a magic hairpin, while I hadn't done anything except bungle a white magic spell. 

We didn't even have to approach the desk. Someone approached us instead. I was only a little surprised to recognize the talkative guard from the night before. 

"Commander Shanya is waiting for you," she said, and Gaav gestured for her to lead the way. 

Shanya's office must have been furnished to her specifications, because while the area between the door and her desk was at normal floor level, the desk itself and the area behind it sat on a raised wooden platform. She was seated at her desk when we entered, wearing same the navy blue uniform and light leather armour as the other guards. The fancy parade armour from last night was on a stand near the back wall. 

"You really do have a brother," she said to Gaav, without bothering with little things like polite greetings. "Although apparently he didn't make it back to the inn last night. And the innkeeper never saw you. Still, I'm surprised." 

Gaav chuckled. "Yes, I was busy when he and Val checked in yesterday. Did you think I was lying to you? Or maybe that we were the same person or something? Gavin's a head taller than I am, just for a start." 

«What are you going to do if she wants to see both of you together?» 

«See if my illusion skills have deteriorated or not, I suppose. Hopefully she won't.» 

"The thought had crossed my mind, and according to the description your brother's clothing could hide just about anything. More than six inches of height difference is a bit tougher to fake, though. I should know," Shanya concluded with a wry grin. 

"Now that that's settled, can you tell us if you've found out anything about the sorceress?" I asked. 

The guard commander looked at me and frowned, but she also said, "It turns out that she wasn't from around here either. We found out where she'd been staying and collected her luggage. Unfortunately, some of it appears to be magical paraphernalia, and we don't have a forensic sorceress on our staff." 

"Do you object if we have a look?" Gaav asked. 

"I was expecting that you would. You understand, of course, that we can't permit you to remove anything from the building." 

"And you're going to supervise us to make sure we don't," Gaav said. "That's fine. If there's anything to find, it shouldn't take us long." 

"Good. Take them to Evidence Room Two," she added to the guard who had shown us to her office, then lingered near the door. "Everything's laid out there." 

Which turned out to be down a flight of stairs, around a corner, and practically at the other end of the building. At least it was well enough lit that, despite being in a basement, I didn't feel the cold hand of claustrophobia sliding down my spine. 

The sorceress hadn't owned much. In addition to what she'd been wearing when she died, I saw one ordinary change of clothes, one nightgown, a pair of slippers, a tin flask, a small packet of hard biscuit and an even smaller one of jerky, two books, a knife (tool variety, not fighting variety), a money pouch, a handful of random magical junk like specialized wands and magic circle diagrams, and a small pouch on a string that might have been worn as a necklace. The drawstring of the pouch was tied in an elaborate knot. 

"Check the clothes," Gaav told me. 

«What am I looking for?» I asked silently. 

«Hidden pockets. Things sewn into seams. Anything that doesn't seem right. Spots where the cloth's too stiff are a dead giveaway.» 

I started with the nightgown, then moved to the clean change of clothes, then, reluctantly, to the clothes the woman had been wearing when she died, which were . . . soiled. In the hem of her robe, I found a two-inch section that was too stiff to be just fabric. 

"Found something?" Gaav asked. 

"Maybe." I examined the seam. "Can I borrow one of your hairpins? I might damage something if I try to unpick this with a knife." And I couldn't use my talons, not with that guard standing there staring at us. 

"Sure." He pulled one of the longer ones, which turned out to have a sharp edge as well as a point. It would have cut through a normal person's hair, but presumably Mazoku were immune to little annoyances like that. 

Unpicking the stitches gave me a piece of thin paper, folded over and over again into a strip half an inch wide. I'd expected an incriminating note, but when I unfolded it, I got a magic circle. Not a very big one, mind you, and slightly damaged in several places where the paper was coming apart at the creases. 

"It's a black magic summoning circle," Gaav said. "Not directly usable at that size and in that condition, of course. It was probably meant to be used as a pattern for a larger version. It's also the only black-magic-related gear she had, unless she ditched it somewhere else—the other circles are for low-level shamanistic transmutation spells, and the wands are just for engraving. Which leaves this nasty little piece of work." He poked at the pouch on the string. "Anyone who tries to untie it gets hit with a poison curse—takes effect maybe an hour later and fries the brain but good, from the look of it. Val, do you know Bright Restoration? It'll work better if you cast it." 

I blinked. "I know the words, but won't that destroy anything enchanted inside the bag?" 

"If your definition of 'destroy' is 'revert to a mundane object', yes, but picking the spell apart is too risky. You know what happens if you screw that up." 

" _I_ don't," said the guard by the door. "And I'm supposed to keep you from damaging anything." 

"If you screw up picking apart a spell, it whiplashes," I said. "In this case, that means it would probably kill whoever was doing the picking apart. If it whiplashes explosively, it would destroy the bag, too." 

"The alternative is to cut the pouch open from the bottom end so that we don't sever the cord," Gaav added. "That might set something else off, though." 

The guard wrinkled her nose. "Um, I think we're going to have to run this past the commander . . ." 

"Run what past me?" With perfect timing, Shanya strode into the room. 

"We want to disenchant this." Gaav poked the bag with his finger. "There's a lethally nasty boobytrap spell on it, and I'd like to see what's inside. The catch is, if whatever's inside the bag is enchanted, killing the boobytrap spell will probably wipe it clean too—it's impossible to be selective. Trying to get inside by using some other method risks having it blow up, though, and possibly kill someone." 

After a moment of contemplation, Commander Shanya nodded decisively. "I don't think that getting information about this case is worth risking people's lives. Go ahead and disenchant it." 

I cleared a section of the table. "Got some chalk?" I asked Gaav, who silently handed me a stick. I wondered where everyone else thought he was keeping it. 

Bright Restoration is the most powerful of the white magic disenchantment spells, much stronger than Flow Break. It requires a magic circle and a couple of minutes of chanting, so it isn't something you can cast in the middle of a fight. Fortunately, the chant is repetitive and the magic circle doesn't have to be a perfect circle, just a closed figure with some runes around the edge, or I would have had to go find a book to check the details. 

It's also normally cast only by priests, but, well, technically I _was_ a priest. Of the wrong kind. And I'd only practice-cast it once, when Filia-mama had first taught it to me. I'd just have to hope I got it right. 

«The circle's right, anyway,» Gaav murmured inside my head as I shifted the pouch to the center of it. «And the Chaos Words aren't complicated or difficult to remember, just long. You'll be fine.» 

«So why don't you cast it?» I tossed back. 

«I could, but it would look weird when we've already established that you're a white mage. Besides, the spirits that power white magic like dragons better than they do Mazoku, which gives the spell a little extra boost.» 

My hand stopped moving for half a beat. «This isn't _that_ nasty a booby-trap spell, is it?» 

«Fuck, no, but the extra boost doesn't hurt. Just finish up, little dragon.» 

Well, at least I was more irritated than nervous now. 

The chant went off flawlessly, and when I said, " _Bright Restoration!_ " in a firm voice at the end, the magic circle flared, sent up a pillar of light, and died away. I glanced at Gaav. 

"It's clear," he said, and sliced the cord with the dead sorceress' eating knife. He opened the bag, poured out what was inside . . . and I stared at it in consternation. 

"It's a skull," the guardswoman, who had moved away from the door to hover near us, said. 

"Rat skull, I think," Gaav said. "And . . . yeah, here we are." He flipped it over with the point of a knife to reveal a symbol branded into the top: a jaundiced-looking eye, inside a circle of runes. "Ruby-Eye's symbol. So this was an amulet, and our sorceress probably belonged to one of the Mazoku-worshipping cults."


	16. Chapter 15

"So this was planned," Shanya said. 

"Looks that way," Gaav agreed. "And it looks like we all have our work cut out for us." 

The guard commander nodded grimly. "You really are going to pursue that . . . thing, then." 

Gaav shrugged. "Someone has to, if we want there to still be a world here in a year's time. And I'm kind of attached to having somewhere to live." 

"Best of luck, then." 

"Thanks. Come on, Val." 

I waited until we'd left the building before I commented, "You're worried about more than just chasing down that thing, aren't you?" 

Gaav gave me a bland look. "I don't know why you'd think so." 

"Because you're scowling again." 

"I do that anyway, a lot of the time." 

"Not really. Usually you're smirking, even when you're pretending to be pissed off. It drives me nuts." 

He snorted. "Didn't think you'd learned me that well again." 

"Maybe part of me does remember whatever past we had, somewhere way down in my subconscious," I said. "So, are you going to tell me what's bothering you, or do I have to go looking for a pry bar?" 

"You saw the sigil burned into that rat skull. Notice anything about it?" 

Not at the time, but I did my best to call it to mind now, considering what it looked like. Trying to see what he'd seen. There were variations in the symbols, I knew, due to copying and recopying, especially in human reference materials. Dragons drew them slightly differently, using versions closer to the origi— 

"You've got to be kidding me," I said out loud. 

Shabranigdo's sigil was an eye above an ocean of blood. Humans just shaded in the bottom third or so of the sigil to represent the ocean, but dragons drew it like a proper sea, with waves. 

There hadn't been room for much detail on the rat skull, but I was sure the shaded part of the sigil had been topped by a wavy line, rather than a straight one. 

"Why use a dragon version of the symbol?" I added. 

Gaav shook his head. "I don't know. Not for certain. But . . . remember when I said, back on the island, that I'd be looking into the business with the jar and the brass demons, through whichever of my old contacts were still around?" 

"Vaguely. So you found something and didn't tell me about it?" I wasn't sure how I felt about that. Irritated, mostly, but underneath . . . I couldn't actually be feeling betrayed, or at least that's what I told myself. 

"Just rumours and shit, but I always knew something wasn't quite right. Most of Phibby's followers got killed off during the Kouma War when he fucked up and Ragradia fried his Priest and General. And no one else ever wanted him around. So who the fuck would want to bring him back to life even if they knew about the jar?" 

We'd nearly reached the gate to the inner city, and Gaav switched to silent communication before continuing, «No one I could find seemed quite sure what was going on, but I turned up some odd bits and pieces. Stuff about a Mazoku chimera made from one of Phibby's minor servants and . . .» 

«And? Come on, don't drag it out.» 

«A blonde, golden-eyed man.» 

«A golden dragon?» 

«I don't know. The description's suggestive, that's all.» We were through the gates now, back in the outer city, and Gaav made a left turn into an alley. Once there, he briefly became a cloud before settling back into his usual bushy-browed male form. He stretched, tilting his head to either side as though to relieve a kink in his neck. "Fuck, am I glad that's over. Let's get back to the other inn so that you can have your bath." He drew his coat out of nothing as he spoke and swirled it into place, then slung his sword over his shoulder. 

"Just a sec," I said, and raised my hands to the collar around my neck. Exploration failed to find a clasp. "How do I get this thing off?" I asked, glaring at Gaav, since this had to have happened when he'd changed it from leather to metal. 

"Here, let me." 

I scowled, but took a step closer to him. His hands reached for the back of my neck, and I gritted my teeth and controlled the flinch. He was a dragon too, or close enough. Which meant that he had to have placed the clasp over the most vulnerable part of my body on purpose, to mess with my head. His fingers seemed to brush against me more than was strictly necessary as he worked on it, or maybe that was just me. It gave me a very strange feeling, nervous and alert and . . . turned on? 

_Oh, hell, not this again._

I jerked away from him as soon as the damnable collar was off and left the alleyway before him. I didn't even care if I got lost on my way to the hotel, so long as it meant that he stopped _touching_ me. 

When this was all over, I was going to go on a tour of the world's silver, black, and dimos dragon aeries and find myself a girlfriend. I made a firm resolution of that. 

He _had_ to just be messing with my head, if he was aware of what he was doing at all. Why would a Mazoku be trying to get a dragon, and a male at that, sexually interested in him unless it was some kind of joke? Could Gaav even have sex? For real, I meant. For purposes of enjoying it. I was sure he could fake it if he just wanted to manipulate someone. 

I left Gaav in our room at The Stationary Caravan and went to the bathhouse located on the opposite side of the inn's inner courtyard. It felt like the first time in years that I'd been alone for longer than it took to go to the latrine. When I thought back, we'd had separate rooms at a couple of inns, but other than that I'd been living practically in Gaav's back pocket ever since we'd left Dallangys Island. I was surprised neither of us was screaming and climbing the walls. We rubbed along better than I'd expected when I'd met the big bastard—other than his occasional teasing, he didn't have any habits that bothered me. And vice-versa, I guess. 

The bathhouse contained four tubs separated by screens and a water system that probably led back to a tank on the roof or something. There was also a stove for heating the water, but I just filled my chosen tub with cold water, tossed in a low-intensity Fireball, then sighed and reclined. 

Hellmaster. Golden dragons. Gaav. I had a lot to think about, and I didn't really want to tackle any of it, but I couldn't get the Chaos Dragon, his warmth and his teasing hands and the memory of the two of us flying together, which I'd never done with Filia or anyone else, off my mind. He also made a very nice hug pillow, warm and dragon-scented and apparently willing to hold me for as long as I wanted him to. 

. . . and we were back here again. I liked him. I felt guilty and angry and disgusted with myself because I liked him. But . . . I sighed, and fingered the scars on the insides of my wrists, which were gradually losing their red colour as everything healed properly for the first time since I'd been a hatchling. 

_But he's clearly good for me._

He understood me better than anyone else I'd ever known. Instead of trying to force me to wrestle with the demons inside my head without access to the only outlet that made it bearable, he prodded me to turn my attentions outward. At him, if necessary. And then absorbed whatever I threw at him. 

But if the only reason he was having anything to do with me was the bond, then I'd already dictated the end of our relationship. I knew I should want to be free of him, free to go my own way, but . . . why did that feel so lonely, when I thought about it? A month ago, I hadn't even met him, just known of him. As a pestilence to be avoided if I'd thought he was alive. 

I couldn't even tell myself that he was just pretending to like me, because I'd been watching him for too long now, seen a couple of split-second unguarded reactions. I _knew_. He had feelings. Affection. Anger. Sometimes I'd even catch the faintest, wistful edge of sorrow. He was a lot more complicated than he appeared on the surface. He wasn't just some force of unrestrained evil, he was a person. 

The water in the tub was beginning to cool. I thought of Fireballing it again, decided against it, and grabbed the soap. I'd clean up properly, wash my hair, and put on fresh clothes. And try not to think about that smirking red-head. 

And then I got back to our suite and it was empty, and my heart jumped into my throat for a moment before I spotted the note on the table. 

_Val, there's some stuff I need to take care of. I'll be back in a couple of hours._ It was signed with a runic G. 

I flopped into a chair. "Son of a bitch," I muttered. And wondered what to do with myself while I waited for him to come back. Meditate, maybe. I hadn't done that in a long time, Ceiphied knew, and I could use some inner calm right about now. My heart was still hammering. It made me feel stupid—what did I think was going to happen to the Ceiphied-damned _Chaos Dragon_ in the middle of a human city that wouldn't also result in the city being blasted to powder? And if something _did_ happen to him, wouldn't it be doing the world a favour? 

I shook my head angrily, and settled myself deeper into my chair. I'd been unable to master the meditation technique that Filia-mama had tried to teach me—not surprising, since it was difficult to be still and quiet around her, plus I'd been too young—and the one I'd learned at the seminary had been elaborately ritualistic, requiring a specific kneeling posture and chant. It had been Father Teremar who had taught me how to relax into myself at any time, anywhere. It was easier if I wasn't actively uncomfortable, but there was no way that was going to be a problem in such a well-padded chair. 

I concentrated on my breathing and let everything else run through my head until it ran out again. It took a while for blood red and ocean blue, the colours of a certain Mazoku's hair and eyes, to finally go away. Or maybe they never entirely did. There was red inside me, pulsing in time with my heartbeat. Solidly anchored, deep down in my mind. I'd never noticed it there before, but the last time I'd done this had been before the demons invaded Copper Cove, and it might have been dormant back then. 

Could I find what it was anchored to? I felt around, searching for some scrap of memory to hook it to, and found pain and exhaustion and anger and hate and the taste of blood in my mouth, and a familiar voice. 

"You're finished, young Val of the ancient dragons." 

I gasped and reeled away from that, losing the meditation. My eyes snapped open. There was no way I could stick with a memory like that one for more than a few seconds! It just hurt too much. All the way down to my bones, like someone had been hacking at me with a hatchet. I would have sworn I'd been able to feel the cold sting of air against my liver. Ceiphied and Ruby-Eye . . . And he'd been there. Gaav. Had that been our real first meeting, from the life he didn't want me to remember? 

Maybe I was starting to understand why he kept trying to keep me from thinking too much about the past. For just a moment, I'd been standing on a diving board at the edge of the Sea of Chaos and looking all the way down. 

_You always felt guilty that you were the only one who made it out alive,_ Gaav had told me. And maybe I was starting to see what it had cost me. What had I done to end up in that state? Who had I fought? Why? And why did the thought make a feeling of sick rage begin to build in my chest and belly? 

Who had killed my people? What had Gaav said to me, offered me, promised me all those years ago? _Revenge._ The word flitted through my mind, and I felt my lips draw back from my teeth. Oh, yes, revenge. Revenge on . . . on . . . 

«Val? Are you okay? Fuck, I can't leave you alone for even ten minutes, can I?» 

The distraction shattered whatever fascination I'd fallen into. I gasped, and the sick feeling started to fade, the knots inside me loosening. «I'm fine.» 

«Huh. All right, I'll take your word for it. This time.» 

"Is it even worth it?" I asked the room out loud. Whatever had driven my previous-life self to him had to have changed by now. Why start digging old skeletons out of the closet? 

But . . . I wanted to know. The guilt sloshing around inside me had been the driving force of my life, and it felt more important to me now to know the reasons behind it than to get rid of it. Peeling back one layer had just roused my curiosity. Survivor's guilt. Joining forces with a Mazoku. _Why?_ Revenge on who? Who had killed the rest of my race? Mazoku? Was that why I'd joined up with Gaav? Because we'd been fighting the same thing? 

Another thing Father Teremar had done was caution me to keep what I _knew_ separate from what I _guessed_ , and to be careful about acting on speculation. So I filed the possibilities away in my head, and tried to remember whether Gaav had told me anything else concrete about the past. 

My title of "Priest" was one thing, but I wasn't entirely certain what it meant or how to connect it to the rest. A Priest was a very high-ranking Mazoku, I knew that, but had I held that status because I'd genuinely possessed that power level, or because Gaav had supported me? 

And . . . I used to hate golden dragons. He'd let that slip. But he hadn't told me why, and I couldn't even imagine it. Not Filia-mama's people, not when she'd gone through so much trouble to raise a hatchling that didn't even belong to her. Unless they'd ostracized me for dealing with Mazoku. That fit, but it was still just speculation, and I knew it. Well, there should be some other dragon somewhere who was able to confirm it for me. I could look for them while I was trying to find a girlfriend. 

None of it made a complete picture, or filled in enough detail to connect me to that dying young dragon with the taste of blood in his mouth, but— 

I blinked. Dying. In that instant of memory, I'd been dying. The me then had known it. 

Gaav must have saved my life. _Which is just like him,_ was my first thought. Except that I knew it wasn't, really. He might be intent on protecting me now, but when we'd first met, I should have been of no more interest to him than any other mortal. 

For some reason he'd chosen me. I didn't understand why, and I couldn't ask without revealing what I had found out. What he didn't want me to know. 

At that moment, the door opened, and Gaav re-entered the suite, a familiar scowl plastered across his face. 

"You don't look happy," I said. 

"That's because no one I could actually find and shake down knew a fucking thing about any of this. We need some fucking minions." 

"So we can just sit on our rumps somewhere and have the information come to us? Sounds good." 

Gaav grunted. "You packed up?" 

"I've got exactly as much luggage as you do," I pointed out. Which was none. "But I thought we weren't leaving until tomorrow." 

"Can you think of anything else to check out around here?" the Dark Lord said. "I doubt the Guard is going to come up with anything we don't already know. We can probably get more information in Seyruun—if you were raised by someone with a connection with Lina Inverse, you can probably use that connection to get some information out of the royal family. Of course, they won't talk to me." 

"Are you saying you need me?" I asked, with a smirk not quite as impressive as his. 

"In this particular set of circumstances. And besides, you need to ask them about this woman Sylphiel, don't you?" 

I shrugged. "They're the only lead I have—and even if they don't know where Sylphiel is, Seyruun's the world's white magic capital, so they should be able to recommend someone. Although I'm not going to cut loose from you until we're done with Hellmaster and his jar." 

"Are you sure? One of us might end up getting killed before you have a chance, and then we'll have to postpone things for maybe as much as another twenty years." 

"I'll take the risk. Let's face it: you need me." 

"Like hell," came the sharp reply . . . but one corner of his mouth crept up and ruined his scowl.


	17. Chapter 16

"For the third time," I said, my hands clenched so tight that even my pathetic flat human nails were digging into my palms. The guard at the gate had passed me to one official, who had passed me to another, who had handed me over to this one without bothering to pass on my explanation of who I was and what I was doing here. My patience had run out long since, and my temper was slowly gnawing through its tether. "My name is Val Ul Copt. I'm here to see Princess Amelia Wil Tesla Seyruun." 

"About . . . ?" the official said, looking down his nose at me even though I was taller by a good two inches. Okay, I knew I looked shabby. Plain clothes, not of the best quality to begin with, and travel-worn. But he didn't have to be such an ass about it. 

"Something's stirring among the Mazoku. Something that may end up affecting Seyruun . . . actually, the entire world." I'd decided, and Gaav had agreed, that "I need help finding Sylphiel Nels Raada" wasn't going to be compelling enough to get me in the door. Given that the Dark Lord had been worried enough to break his low-profile rule and teleport us here instead of riding, it wasn't even a lie. 

Plan B, if I couldn't get in by asking nicely, involved holding a random official hostage. Plan C had Gaav blasting down the gates, planting the guards upside-down in the flowerbeds, and generally rampaging through the building. We both hoped we wouldn't have to use that one, since it meant that at best, we were going to spend a long time arguing with people over damages before we got to what we'd come for, and at worst we were going to draw the attention of the other Dark Lords, but we didn't have time to cook up something more subtle. 

The Seyruunese official was still looking at me like I was something with too many legs that he'd found swimming in his soup. "The Princess is a very busy person." 

"Please just tell her I'm here," I said—although if not for those years of training in priestly meekness, I would have hauled off and hit him. "If she's unwilling to see me, that's fine." Because we did have a Plan B, and I was going to enjoy holding my talons against this jerk's throat. "But it's important that it be her decision. Otherwise, I'm going to make a Lina-Inverse-sized mess." And I subvocalized a Lighting spell and let it hover above my palm, just for emphasis. 

The official swallowed. He looked about forty—old enough to remember the last couple of times the real Lina Inverse had been through. "Wait here, please." 

He scurried off, leaving me in the middle of a hallway. It looked like in Seyruun, "Lina Inverse" was a name to conjure with. Moreso than "Chaos Dragon Gaav", even. I just hoped he hadn't gone looking for a squad of guards or something. That might end up being messy. 

Ten minutes later, I was more worried about being bored to death than accosted by the guards. I mean, I didn't dare wander too far, and a stone floor and walls—even marble ones—plus two closed doors, four landscape paintings, and a bust of some deceased Seyruun notable (Prince Randionel Seyruun, who must have been pretty unpopular to have his statue consigned to an untrafficked dead-end corridor) didn't exactly give me much to look at. 

I was considering letting my talons manifest and doing a little recarving of the statue—Prince Randy would have looked better with crossed eyes and a mustache, or at least _I_ thought so—when someone behind me cleared his throat. I spun around, almost pulling my blades from their hiding place in a curl of nothing, which I guess proved I was more on-edge than I'd thought. 

The person who had cleared his throat wasn't the captain of a guard squad, though. A bit shorter than I was, with hair that gleamed like polished steel in the light falling from the lamps and blue skin with odd roughened greyish patches . . . which meant there was only one person he could possibly be, although I hadn't seen him since I was a tiny hatchling. 

"Zelgadis Greywords," I said slowly. "I didn't know you were in Seyruun." And Filia-mama's descriptions had always given me the impression that he tried to hide his face, but he was wearing a fancy jacket with no hood or mask in sight. 

"I live here now, more or less," he said. "I have to admit I was pretty surprised when I found out you were here—the last time I saw you, you'd only just hatched. It's . . . weird, realizing that it's been more than twenty years since we met Filia. Anyway, Amelia really is busy, since we're infested with ambassadors at the moment, so we hoped that I would do instead." 

I grimaced. "I hope so, because this is serious. It looks like there's a piece of Hellmaster Phibrizzo still out there." 

The chimera's eye's widened. "How . . . No, let's start by sitting down. This is _not_ a conversation we should be having in the hallway." 

I would give the Royal Palace of Seyruun this: it had really nice sitting rooms. Really nice, _durable_ sitting rooms, with sofas that had thick leather upholstery I'd be hard-put to damage without applying my talons. 

"A lot of us here are kind of hard on the furniture," Zelgadis said, with a lopsided smile. He must have noticed me stroking the leather. "Now, about Hellmaster . . ." 

Gaav and I had agreed on a story that hewed as close to the truth as possible without including him as more than an ordinary human swordsman: the brass demons in Copper Cove had left due to a timely typhoon, I used a spell I'd learned at the seminary to track the jar (Gaav had taught me an appropriate one, just in case), the zombie naval ship and the entire business with Zangulus and Martina and the pirates were omitted as not really germane, and the demon fragment had left the auction house after being bombarded with miscellaneous astral shamanism attacks. The timing was also rejiggered a bit to allow for flying instead of teleportation, but leaving out the pirate fortress made that relatively easy. 

" . . . then we flew here because it was the first place we could think of where we might be able to get some help," I concluded. 

Zelgadis was looking at me soberly. He hadn't even asked any questions, just blinked a few times or raised a stony brow. I wasn't sure how much of what I said he'd believed. "And this partner of yours left you to come up here alone?" 

I shrugged. "He said he had some kind of history with this place, and it wasn't good. Maybe he was tossed out of the royal guard or something. Does it really matter?" 

"I suppose not." But Zelgadis was frowning. "Do you have any idea where the Phibrizzo-bit might be going?" 

"Our best guess was Sairaag," I said. "Do you have any contacts there?" 

"Sort of." Still frowning. "I . . . Oh, hell. I guess there's no way we can get away with not bringing Ame into this, and probably King Phil, too. But prying them away from the ambassadors is going to be tricky." 

"Why do you have so many ambassadors here right now, anyway?" I asked. "I mean, they probably go back and forth all the time, but an _infestation_ of ambassadors doesn't sound normal." 

"I don't think it's anything to do with this, if that's what you're worried about. There was a drought in parts of Ralteague and the Coastal States last year, and we promised them enough food to keep people alive through to the beginning of harvest this year. If it had been, say, Ralteague and Dils, it wouldn't be so bad, but each little tiny bit of land in the Coastal States is officially independent and has to send its own ambassador. We've got nearly twenty of them, and they're all arguing over who should get how much grain and how many carrots." The chimera shook his head and sighed. "For the first time in living memory, people other than me and Amelia have actually been wishing Lina Inverse would show up. Lina might blow up half the city, but at least she'd get rid of the ambassadors. Anyway, I doubt the others are going to be able to get free until after supper. Bring your partner, friend, whatever he is . . ." 

"Travelling companion," I said firmly. "Even with an invitation, he may not agree to come, but I'll ask." 

"Right. Anyway, I have to be getting back to the ambassadors. Nine o'clock tonight, okay? We'll find you rooms in the palace for the night. Oh, and take this." He pulled a small object from his pocket and handed it to me. It was a piece of metal, maybe tin or pewter, a couple of inches long, stamped with the Seyruunese arms and the number "LXXVI". "Show that to the guards and they'll give you a lot less trouble." 

"Don't they get stolen a lot?" I asked, looking dubiously at the token. 

"There's a register of who has each one. I'll stop off on the way back to the conference room and have you added." 

"Thanks." _I think._ I slid it into my pocket—for some reason, I felt uncomfortable using my space twist in front of the chimera. 

Almost as uncomfortable as I felt half an hour later, relaying his invitation to Gaav, who scowled and fingered his chin, seated on a bed in a shabby-but-clean inn room. 

"I think we've been bitten on the ass by our own caution," he said. "If I'd known the chimera would be here, I might have set things up a bit differently, but too late now. If I keep hiding, they're just going to get convinced that there's something fishy going on, and I'd bet the chimera's going to insist on coming to Sairaag with us, too. And every member of my shitty family probably has at least a jar demon or two watching him, because he used to be close to Lina Inverse. Which means more shapeshifting. Fuck. I'm already holding my aura in so hard I'm on the edge of choking on it." 

He rose to his feet, still scowling, and I watched as his body blurred and lost surface definition, although it didn't quite diffuse into black smoke the way it had in that alleyway in Troanna. He kept roughly the same height and build this time, but when the blurring cleared, the details were different. 

The man in front of me still had long hair, but it was black threaded with gray at the temples, and pulled straight back into a single braid, with no bangs to hide his widow's peak or the way his hairline was just beginning to recede. His eyebrows were thin pencil lines of black, and he had a narrow face with a pointed chin. A scar started near his left ear, then wandered across his cheek and up over the bridge of his nose, showing white against darkly tanned skin. And the garish trenchcoat had vanished, leaving behind light leather armour worn over clothes in faded shades of green-grey. Gaav had even included little details like crow's feet, laugh lines, scars on the armour, and a patch on the knee of his trousers. The only things he'd kept from his familiar red-headed incarnation, besides his size, were his sea-blue eyes and the sword slung over his shoulder. 

I watched as he traced the scar with his fingers, touched his earlobe, and added a gold earring set with a black pearl. "That should be good enough," he said. His voice was still deep, but it sounded raspy. "Did I miss anything?" 

I examined him critically. "If you did, I can't see it . . . although you might want to add some more scars under the clothes, if you haven't already." 

"I figured that. Little stuff on both forearms, and an extra here—" He traced a diagonal line at belt level. "—plus the one down my shoulder that I can't seem to get rid of. Should be enough. The good fighters don't tend to pick up too many." 

"So am I still supposed to call you 'Gavin', or are you going to come up with a better alias this time? I was careful not to give Zelgadis your name, just in case." 

Gaav raised an eyebrow. "I didn't pick that name because I couldn't come up with anything better—I picked it because it sounds enough like my real one I react to it automatically. So yeah, we'll keep it. Gavin . . . Let's stick with 'Rufous', too. Consistency's always good. From . . . hmm. Sebasis? We were there recently enough that I've got some idea what it looked like five years or so before Phibby took me down. No living family, I think. Makes things simpler. Beyond that, I haven't told you much." 

Sebasis was a port city in the Outer World, a really big one. I'd even been there myself, on my way from the seminary to Copper Cove. Deciding that I could remember two more facts on top of the bullshit we'd already spun, I nodded. 

_So now he has me lying for him._ The thought popped into my head. It was lucky, that thought, because if it had been on the outside of me instead, I would have skewered it with my best death glare. Even the priest-instructors at the seminary had understood the concept of a white lie, and I couldn't see how revealing Gaav's real nature could possibly be anything less than disastrous here. 

I'd made a decision to put the jar and saving the world from Hellmaster before my own concerns about being tied to a Mazoku, because I knew it was The Right Thing To Do. If I had to lie to keep the world from being destroyed, well, then, lying was the right thing to do. Even if it would make things more difficult afterwards. 

"Now that we've settled that, let's go eat," Gaav said. I knew he knew what I'd been thinking, but thankfully he was tactful enough not to say anything about it. 

As we split a small roast chicken, it occurred to me that although I'd seen Gaav eat and drink, I'd never seen him have to . . . deal with the normally inevitable consequences. I mean, he'd never used the bucket chamberpot on the fishman ship or ducked behind a bush on the trail during our travels through Elmekia, much less visited any more civilized facilities. So did he process the food differently or something? Neat trick, if so. I wondered where I could get some. 

Afterwards, we walked a meandering path through the city to kill time. Seyruun was large enough to still be quite active in the evenings. We even stopped for a while to watch a street performance. 

"I am the beautiful sorcery genius Lina Inverse, and I shall save the city from the evil Mazoku and restore Prince Phil to his rightful place!" declared the hand puppet, waving its stumpy arms in a gesture that I think was supposed to look mystical or something. 

"She's going to make a mess again," sighed the puppet with the blue face. 

"That's just Lina," said the one with the blonde hair. I could almost hear the shrug, although the puppets themselves weren't capable of such a subtle gesture. 

The "evil Mazoku" puppet seemed to be the purple one with the four arms that was "standing" on a raised platform at the back of the stage. "I am Kazendel!" it boomed. "And there is no way I will permit you to free the prince! Prepare to meet your doom, Lina Inverse, in the name of the great Lord Gaav!" 

«Did any of this really happen?» I asked Gaav silently. 

The Dark Lord shrugged. «This _exactly_ , no, but it might be a really distorted version of what happened when I tried to have Kanzel and Mazenda take over Seyruun. I don't think the original would make for good kiddie theatre, what with all the betrayals and shit.» 

«Mmm.» I cast my mind back to the half-forgotten story, and decided he was probably right. «Did you really want to recruit Lina Inverse?» 

«Mazenda came up with that on her own initiative, although I have to admit that the sorceress would have been an asset. Plus, if she'd sworn herself to me, I wouldn't have had to try to kill her. It was after that that everything started to go to shit.» Gaav was scowling. Bad memories, I guess. 

Silently, I turned and began to walk away from the puppet show. Silently, he followed. We didn't stop again as we would our way up toward the palace, where showing the crest-thing Zelgadis had given me at the gate got us in immediately without having to be passed from official to official. 

After nearly getting run down by what might have been an ambassadorial retinue (or at least I hoped the fat guy with the powdered wig was an ambassador, because if Seyruun had officials that looked like that, I was going to lose all my respect for the place), we settled in an out-of-the-way place in the lee of a staircase and waited for nine o'clock to roll around, since we were about ten minutes early. 

That kept anyone from tripping over or running into us, but others weren't so lucky. 

"Ah!" A near miss involving another ambassadorial retinue sent a woman staggering in our direction. I caught her by the shoulders and steadied her. 

_Priestess robes are more practical than they look, but that still isn't very practical,_ Filia-mama had told me once. This priestess should have been used to them, though, because she looked like she had to be in her thirties, and most full clerics come into their vocation while they're in their early teens. 

My, "Are you all right?" ended up overlapping with her, "I'm sorry, I—" before she stopped and blinked and looked at me. 

I gestured for her to go on. 

"I was afraid I was going to be late for a meeting," she said, "and I wasn't paying much attention to where I was going. Neither was that ambassador, I guess." She giggled. "Thank you for helping me . . . although I think I may go back to wearing a tunic and leggings whenever I visit the palace. You can't trip over those." 

"True," I said. I was expecting her to leave, since she'd already been in a hurry, but another voice interrupted us. 

"Val, Sylphiel! Good, you're both here." Zelgadis was approaching quickly, but I barely noticed. 

Sylphiel. 

This woman was the one I'd been intending to look for? 

I wasn't sure whether this was very good or very bad.


	18. Chapter 17

"It isn't Seyruun specifically," "Gavin Rufous" lied smoothly. "More that I've had a lot of past problems with nobles and royals. I prefer to stay away when I can, but this doesn't look like a situation where I can get away with that." 

We were sitting in a conference room with Zelgadis, Princess Amelia (who was somewhat taller now than she was in Filia-mama's stories), King Philiomel (a huge, ugly man with iron-grey hair and moustache) and Sylphiel. All of them seemed to have accepted "Gavin" at face value, thank Ceiphied. It probably helped that the two who had met Gaav in person thought he was dead. 

"That aside," King Phil said, "if a piece of Hellmaster still exists and is heading for Sairaag, its people are in grave danger." 

"They had a difficult enough time rebuilding it after the disasters twenty years ago," Zelgadis added. "The city never did regain its full population. If it gets hit again, it might become a ghost town, and in addition to the lives lost, that would disrupt trade all over the continent and maybe even start a war. We can't let it happen." 

Sylphiel looked like she was feeling sick. Come to think of it, wasn't Sairaag her hometown? Was that why they'd invited her here? Then her jaw firmed, and she said, "I won't let him disturb our dead again." 

"I think we are all agreed that someone must go to Sairaag and deal with this," King Phil said. 

"Unofficially," Gaav added. 

"Unfortunately, that's true. If Seyruun is seen to be interfering in the affairs of Lyzeille, it would be a diplomatic disaster. We might even touch off a war ourselves. Relations are touchy right now." Phil sighed and propped his head on his hands. "That means I can't go, even incognito, and I can't send troops." 

"And Lina and Gourry are in the Outer World right now, poking around some dragon ruins," Zelgadis said. "We'll send a message to them, of course, but it's going to be a while before they make it back up here." 

"Hopefully we won't need them," I said. "This thing isn't nearly as strong as the original Hellmaster. In fact, I'd say that it's less than half as strong as Xellos. It can't be a match for all of us working together." It certainly wasn't a match for Gaav. 

"We—Amelia and I— _have_ taken out a couple of lesser Mazoku without help from Lina," the chimera said. "Maybe with you along, it'll be enough. And, um, do you know any magic, Gavin-san?" 

"Fire and some astral shamanism," Gaav . . . well, I suppose he wasn't lying, but he wasn't telling the whole truth, either. "Also some black magic attack spells, but not enough to be of much use here. My best spell is Val Flare." He shot me a wink. "Felzareid is right at the edge of my pool capacity: I can cast it, but not more than once a day and not if I've been casting many other spells. I do know Astral Vine. I suck at white magic, though—just can't get the hang of it." 

Zelgadis raised his stony eyebrows. "That's pretty respectable, though." 

Gaav smirked. "For someone who looks like a big, dumb wall of muscle, you mean. Don't worry, I've heard it all before, and I'm long past the age where I can be hurt by playground insults. Anyway, the best contribution I can make to whatever plan we end up with is probably to enchant my sword and stand guard over the people doing the heavy lifting." Truth, lies, all neatly knotted together like the ugly macrame plant hanger Filia had once received from a neighbour. 

There was a moment during which no one spoke. Or moved, I think. Then Zelgadis sighed. 

"I'll be going with you, I guess," he said. 

"And I'm going too," Princess Amelia said firmly. "We'll double Ra Tilt this Mazoku to death!" 

Now everyone was looking at Sylphiel. Me included. The priestess was staring down at the table, and the expression on her face made it look like she was wandering through a nightmare. 

«She is,» Gaav informed me. «I'm not sure of the content, but I can taste the misery easily enough.» 

«Enjoying it?» I asked, a bit sarcastically. 

«Not really. Too bitter. Old nightmares often are.» And, unexpectedly, he shared the flavour with me—something like brussels sprouts with lemon. I was just barely able to control the recoil when I realized what he'd done, to turn it into a tightening of my muscles that didn't involve any obvious movement. 

«Why the hell did you do that?» 

«Because I don't know what the fuck I want anymore, I suppose.» And he closed himself off. I was very aware of the taste vanishing from my tongue. 

I might not remember, but he did. And he clearly missed whatever . . . companionship . . . I'd offered him in the old days. It was clear that I was hurting him, and it made me feel guilty, and angry that I felt guilty. _He_ was the one who insisted on keeping all his little secrets, damn him! 

What in hell had passed between us for us to get from "You're finished" to . . . wherever we had ended up? 

"I'll go," Sylphiel said, derailing my train of thought. "I said I wouldn't let them be used again, and I meant it. But it's going to be difficult. If only Flagoon had survived, then maybe . . ." 

Gaav snorted. "Just how would you expect it to have pulled through? Flagoon was a tool cross-bred by elves to draw the miasma out of the area where Zanaffar was buried. It ate the energies left behind on the astral by that thing's corpse and transformed them into something more natural. But while I don't know for sure, my bet is that Hellmaster used the remaining miasma to power whatever fucking show he put on for you guys twenty years ago. Without a miasma source, the tree would have died even if Hellmaster hadn't uprooted it." 

Everyone was staring at him. Including me. 

«Is that true?» I tried to ask, but he was still closed off. 

"How do you know all of that?" Zelgadis sounded almost accusing. 

"I found some engravings and shit in the ruins of an elven temple five or six years ago. It made me curious, so I spent some time checking up on it." 

Zelgadis stiffened, and his expression turned almost eager. "That temple—was there anything in the engravings about chimeras?" 

Gaav raised his eyebrows. "I don't think so, but when this is done I can try to put you in touch with the Outer World archaeologist I was escorting. She might be able to tell you something more. Hey, you didn't think I'd be poking around in a place like that for free, did you? There's never any treasure in an elf temple that's worth enough to make up for burning and hacking your way through all the weird carnivorous plants." 

I wondered how long it had been since he'd actually visited an elven temple. Or if he ever really had. 

"Anyway," Gaav said, "there's no time to waste, so we should probably leave in the morning. Even flying, it's going to take a couple of days for us to get to Sairaag. Assuming Val's up to carrying all of us." 

"I don't see why it should be a problem," I said. I might have worried about Zelgadis, but he didn't leave dents in the floor when he walked, so he couldn't be _that_ heavy. 

Still, I couldn't help but think that we were hoist on our own petard again. Or maybe Gaav thought that having the extra backup-slash-distraction was worth the extra two days in transit. 

The bedroom they gave me at the palace was nice, with a big featherbed with silk sheets, but I had a hard time getting to sleep. After an hour or so, I realized I was missing the sound of someone else's snoring, and irritably slapped myself with a weak Sleeping spell. Of course, that meant I woke up feeling groggy and made a breakfast that I think would otherwise have been kind of grim edge over into "surreal". At least being too out of it to be worried meant that I didn't suffer from the problem the other mortals had with being unable to eat. 

I finally woke up the rest of the way as we were walking through the city. It was still very early in the morning, with few people on the streets other than us, but there were a few stalls and shops open, and the ones that sold food were doing decent business. Zelgadis and Princess Amelia were walking together in front of us, and Gaav was steering me gently every now and then with a touch to my shoulder. 

I blinked, looked around, and asked, "Where's Sylphiel?" 

Gaav snorted. "I figured you weren't quite awake for that part. She's meeting us outside town. Wants to say good-bye to the Flagoon sapling they planted on the body of the Zanaffar Lina Inverse killed near here twenty years ago, or so they told me." 

"Wouldn't it be better just to fly out there—using Ray Wing, I mean—instead of walking through the city?" I asked. 

"I don't do that," Princess Amelia said seriously from up front. "It's important for the people of Seyruun to see their rulers, to know that we're here and paying attention and working for them." 

I shrugged. I guessed it made sense in its way, for cutting down on revolts and stuff. I'd never thought much about what went into running a kingdom before. 

"I'm surprised the city isn't full of assassins," Gaav said. 

"Every couple of years, one does manage to make it this far," Zelgadis said. "Mostly they're sent by Elmekia and Ralteague. But Amelia's pretty good at defending herself. And a lot more of them get spotted and dealt with further out, by the military or even the ordinary citizens." 

"I prefer that they don't do that, though." Amelia sounded kind of dejected. "People get hurt that way." 

"They do it because they think you're important," Zelgadis said. I got the impression that they'd discussed this before, without either being able to persuade the other. 

Outside the gates, we followed the main road for about ten minutes before turning aside onto a narrow path that wound up and over a hill, then back down again into a valley with a smallish lake and a very large tree. It dwarfed Sylphiel, who was kneeling at the foot of it. 

"That's a _sapling_?" I asked incredulously. 

"Compared to the original Flagoon, yes," Zelgadis said. "You could have housed a city in the old tree's branches. This one might accommodate a small town, at best." 

I wanted to ask Gaav if it was really true, but he was still closed off from me. It was starting to get annoying. 

I almost missed a step. Did I really mean that? I'd gotten so used to the voice in my head that the loss of that private avenue of communication bothered me? 

_I really need to get done with Hellmaster and his stupid jar and get Sylphiel to help break this bond. It's making a mess out of the inside of my head._

Sylphiel rose to her feet as we approached, and offered us all a quiet smile and a nod. She didn't have any visible luggage, but then neither did anyone else on this crazy expedition. 

"I'm ready," she said firmly. 

_I guess it's my turn, then._ "I need a bit of space," I said, and turned to walk away from the tree. I think Princess Amelia began to follow, but Gaav blocked her with an extended arm and a few words that I didn't pay any attention to. 

The last time I'd reverted to my natural form had been when I'd jumped from that headland in Elmekia, nearly two weeks ago. It felt good to stretch . . . and stretch . . . and stretch. I flexed my wings a bit, then crouched down and extended a foreleg to help the tiny creatures on the ground below me climb up, although it turned out to be superfluous when everyone cast Levitation. 

"Me and the chimera should keep to his shoulders between the wing-roots, seeing as we're the heaviest," Gaav said as they sorted themselves out. "The girls can go in front or behind. And whatever you do, don't lean out too far, or you may end up dumping all of us off as Val tries to get his balance back." 

I wondered if Gaav had ever carried passengers in his dragon-form, since he seemed to know exactly how to go about it. I doubted another dragon would have been willing to carry him, but you never knew. Right now, with his aura, as he'd said, drawn in tight, I might not have been able to figure out what he was if I hadn't known. Just a faint warmth, and a smell of blood and iron . . . not like Xellos, who always felt like someone had smeared a gob of something cold and viscous and slightly fishy-smelling across the vulnerable back of my neck. Filia-mama said that all Mazoku felt like that, but I doubted she'd ever even met any others. 

Everyone seemed to have settled down, so I stood up slowly and, when no one seemed to come unseated, bunched my legs and took off. One of the women squealed at the lurch as we became airborne—I think it was Sylphiel. 

Other than that, I'd never known that flying could be so boring. Or so much work. I had to do my best to stay level, to not go too high, to safeguard my passengers. That meant that I couldn't fly efficiently, slipping from one current of wind to the next, up where the air was thin. I'd never pumped my wings so hard for so long, and by mid-morning they were getting pretty sore. 

Even worse, no one seemed to want to talk to me except to yell directions—not that they were talking much to each other either, since it would have been difficult to make themselves heard over the rush of the wind, but I was frustrated that Gaav was still blocking that damned bond. Never mind that I'd never wanted to be connected to him in the first place. Being able to talk to him without the others overhearing would have been _useful_ right now. 

Just before noon, I began spiralling down toward a valley just beyond the edge of a small town. It was big enough to have a couple of restaurants to choose from, and I needed fuel and an opportunity to rest my wings. My passengers . . . didn't exactly agree, but they didn't argue with me, either. 

I think the locals must have noticed us landing, because a couple of minutes after we reached the main road into town, we passed a mob with torches, pitchforks, and other improvised weapons going the other way. I was going to have to find a different location to take off from when we left. 

The restaurant we picked was really more of a cafe, and it was a nice enough day that we gathered around one of the outside tables. After a quick scan of the menu, I ordered the meatiest thing that they had—roast beef—while most of the others went with soup and sandwiches. Including Gaav. I assumed he was trying to shore up his pretense of being human, especially since I didn't think he'd eaten much at breakfast. Well, whatever. All that I cared about right now was that I was _hungry_. I'd worked too hard to fill up on astral energy alone, as an older dragon might have been able to do. So I stuffed myself with beef and carrots and potatoes and some kind of bread-y thing that I didn't know the name of. It all tasted delicious. 

"We're about a third of the way across Ralteague," Zelgadis said, sipping his coffee. "When we did this with Lina, it took nearly a month to get here from Seyruun City." 

"We should be into the mountains tomorrow morning," Gaav said. "The passes are fucking nasty this time of year, all rotten snow, but since we're flying and not climbing it shouldn't matter very much. We should be at Sairaag by midafternoon." 

"If none of you freezes something, that is," I added. "I'm going to have to go up pretty high to get through the mountains." 

There was an annoying tickle at the back of my throat. I coughed, and blinked as something hot, wet, and metallic-tasting welled up into my mouth. I touched my lips with a finger, and brought them away smeared with red. 

What in hell? 

"Something's wrong," I tried to say, but that just made me cough more blood, leaving a spray of red across the plate I'd just cleaned. " _Glkh—_ " 

"Val! Dicleary, _now_!" Gaav snapped at Sylphiel, and I think he might have put a bit of magic into it, because she obeyed immediately. As she recited the spell, Gaav grabbed the bottle of vinegar from the assortment of condiments at the center of the table and shook some onto the smears of gravy and blood on my plate. After a couple of seconds, a yellow scum rose to the surface. "Fuck!" 

"What's going on? Has Val-san been poisoned?" Princess Amelia asked. 

"Exactly. That yellow shit is dragonsbane residue." 

" _Dicleary!_ " the priestess finished, and a warm white light settled over me. As it faded, I tried to straighten up, but found myself coughing again. This time, there was more than just a splatter of blood. It pooled on the surface of the plate, and more yellow scum rose. I would have planted my nose in it if Gaav hadn't caught me as I swayed forward. 

"Why isn't he getting any better?" Zelgadis said through the ringing in my ears. There were odd shadows flickering across my vision. 

"It triggers a fucking autoimmune reaction," Gaav snarled. "Physical and astral. Now that . . . might be . . ." 

I couldn't make out any words after that as he lifted me from my chair and began yelling at someone else, right before the world drifted away completely.


	19. Chapter 18

I was . . . being carried? Yeah, that felt like it. Steady rocking of someone's stride. My shoulder rubbing against a broad chest. Familiar smell of male dragon musk, with overtones of metal, blood, and smoke. I turned my head a little, felt leather rubbing against my cheek, and that was . . . not quite right. There should have been folds of cloth there, according to my hazy brain. 

"Just rest, Val." Bare murmur of sound. 

"Yes, Gaav-s'ma," I muttered, barely aware of what I was saying. It felt right, though, despite the gasp from somewhere nearby. 

"He's pretty out of it," grated a deep voice. "Given that, I don't care what the fuck he calls me. But we need to get him to bed, and if that fucking inn is 'right around the corner', well, it must have been some other corner." 

"He can't suddenly . . . revert to his other shape, can he?" someone else asked. A woman. 

"He needs to do a spell in his head to change, so probably not." 

_Not a spell, exactly,_ I thought. But let him explain it whatever way he wanted. 

"Cold," I muttered, because I was. 

"You've got a fever. Idiot dragon." 

"Oh." I snuggled up closer, because he was warm. 

A soft, exasperated snort. A picture wavered in front of my mind's eye—bushy red eyebrows drawn down in a scowl even as the corners of his mouth turned up. Yeah. 

"Are you sure he's going to be all right?" The woman again. 

"We cleared the stuff out of him pretty fast, so the reaction should burn itself out in a day or so. He'll be pretty fucking shaky for another day or two after that, though." 

"So we're going to lose at least two days of travel time," a different voice mused. "It's hard to believe this wasn't done on purpose." 

"What the fuck makes you think it wasn't? Dragonsbane isn't exactly pepper, chimera. If a human had eaten that gravy, he would have puked all over the table. No, we were set up. And I'll give you three guesses as to by who." The voice was full of deep disgust. 

"Hellmaster." The other man sounded equally disgusted. "Is that the inn?" 

"Huh. Maybe." 

"I'll go get us some rooms." The woman. 

A grunt from the one carrying me. I wanted to reassure him, but scraping the words together was too difficult just then. There should have been a path from me to him that wouldn't have required organizing my lips and teeth and tongue, but I couldn't seem to find it. 

Someone was making distressed-hatchling noises somewhere nearby. Oh, wait. Was that me? 

"Shit. Hit him with a Sleeping spell, would you? He's going to wear himself out like this." 

"I understand." A different woman. " _Sleeping!_ " 

I fell, fell, fell . . . from the chill of where I had been to the chill of a desert night . . . 

_"Get ahold of yourself."_

_I grunted understanding, but I also dug my fingers, pitiful human-shaped fingers that I didn't have the concentration left to turn into talons, into his coat for a more secure grip. He might be a Dark Lord, but he was warm and strong and I was so very tired._

_I could hear his heart beating steadily, in a slow, powerful rhythm. Since he'd pulled the sword out, mine was matching it, pulse for pulse. Although I didn't understand why a Mazoku would need a heartbeat at all._

_"Valgaav."_

_That grabbed onto something inside me and tugged at it painfully. Valgaav. I wasn't a dragon anymore, I was . . . something else. Something he had made. I could feel the ache of distorted bone and flesh around the horn that sprouted from my forehead, and the heaviness in the base of my skull where a power I wasn't yet used to had settled uncomfortably. I didn't want to explore that yet, although eventually I knew I was going to have to._

_"Valgaav," he repeated, and I forced myself to focus my eyes and look at him. "I'd prefer to give you more time to recover, but we have to go_ now _. Something of Hellmaster's noticed that flare of power I just sent up, and while I could kill it fairly easily, you're in no shape for a fight."_

Don't look weak, _I told myself. Somehow I had a feeling that Maryuuoh Gaav wouldn't appreciate weakness. I got my feet under me, and once I wavered my way to something like balance, I let go of his coat. Physically, I didn't feel all that bad, I realized. A bit unsteady, yes, and my flesh was burning where wounds were closing with unnatural speed, but I was strong enough to stand and walk. Maybe even to run or fly. Inside my head was another story. I was mentally exhausted and emotionally wrung out. Three days and nights I'd fled, without sleep or food, and in the end, I hadn't escaped. The goldens had used their teleportation spells during the chase, so_ they'd _had time to rest, the bastards. I snarled at the memories, all new and raw and bleeding, as Gaav's hand came to rest on my shoulder._

_"Brace yourself," he warned me. "There're going to be other Mazoku where we're coming out, and they'll kick your ass into next week if they sense you're not in any shape to fight back. You'll have to hold on for maybe a couple of minutes before I can shuffle you off somewhere else. Can you do it?"_

_I squared my shoulders. "Yeah." Why in hell was he being . . . almost nice?_

_The world . . . hiccuped, twice in quick sequence, and we were somewhere else. Some kind of . . . stone building? Cave? The room was rectangular and neatly squared off, but there were no windows or proper etheric lighting, just smoky torches. And people, or at least I thought they were supposed to be. Lots of people, rather oddly shaped in some cases._

_"What's this?" one of them asked sharply. He looked like a middle-aged human male, as broad as Gaav but shorter, with a stripe of pale hair running from the center of his forehead to the nape of his neck, bisecting an otherwise dark mane. I could sense something else from him, though, like the flat of a burning-hot blade pressed against my arm, leaving little triangular red marks behind._

_I gave him a smirk. "What business is it of yours?" Mazoku weren't nice people. I couldn't respond to them gently, as I'd always been taught to do. My only model for aggressive behaviour was Gaav—unless I wanted to try to act like a golden dragon—so I did my best to imitate the Dark Lord's infinite self-confidence. The expression, the pose, the words and the tone of voice . . . they all felt unnatural, but hopefully this idiot wouldn't be able to tell._

_"You stink of dragon." Well, at least he was looking at me directly now._

_"Rashatt," Gaav rumbled. "Valgaav will be working with us from now on. That's all you need to know."_

_"And are we letting just any mortal beggar join us now, Lord?" Rashatt retorted._

_The Dark Lord raised an eyebrow. "Feed from him, then. If you can."_

_I didn't feel anything, but Rashatt's expression shifted quickly from annoyed to angry to frightened._

_"Now do you understand?" Gaav asked, no longer showing any signs of amusement._

_"Yes, Gaav-sama," Rashatt said, although he also glared at me._

_Well, it was nice that he understood, because I didn't._

_«It means you're stronger than he is, little dragon.» Gaav's telepathic voice was smooth, and his face bore no sign of effort, which meant that he was much better at that particular skill than I was. «That doesn't mean you're free to tangle with him, though. You have a lot to learn before you'll be able to stand up against his dirty tricks.»_

_He put his hand on my shoulder and guided me across the room to a narrow passageway that had been less carefully finished than the larger room. We were underground, I decided. Somewhere._

_There was a door at the end of the passage, but we never reached it. Instead, Gaav stopped midway and put his hand to the right wall, and another door formed under his fingers._

_"This'll be yours from now on," he said, indicating the door. "Go get yourself cleaned up—your hair's a fucking mess, by the way—and get some rest, because tomorrow you're going to start learning how to be a Mazoku."_

_Ugh. What a thought. And yet . . . it was what I needed now. To learn the ways of violence. Otherwise no one would ever teach the goldens a lesson. The rage inside me was like the molten center of the world: hidden, but also hot beyond bearing. And it twisted and turned and ate away at my gut even when I was trying to think about other things._

_"I'll try not to be a disappointment to you, Gaav-sama." In the desert, I'd begged Valwin and Rangort and anyone who would listen for help, but he was the only one who had heard . . . or at least the only one who had lifted a talon to save me. I owed him everything, now._

_I received an unexpectedly penetrating look. "I don't think you will be, little dragon." And one big hand ruffled the matted, sandy mess that was my hair. Then he turned away and walked down the hall to the door at the far end, leaving me to open the one that he'd created in front of my eyes._

_On the other side, I found a bedroom with an attached private bathing room, neither of them containing much but the essential furnishings. A wide, empty shelf held a hairbrush and comb and two piles of folded clothing. And a rack held . . . weapons. Sword, spear, knives. All mine now, apparently, along with the soap and towels in the bathroom and the grey blanket on the bed._

_This was everything I owned now, and I wanted none of it._

_A full-length mirror on the inside of the door to the bath caught my eye, and I stopped and stared, horrified. Not at my condition so much, although my clothes looked like well-used dusting rags and I was pretty sure I would never be able to untangle my hair. No, what made me feel sick to my stomach was the horn, black and twisted and ugly. The most visible sign of what had happened, although there were also the markings that slashed across my face, broad stripes of pigment, and the dozens of scars that showed fresh and angrily red against my skin._

_Instinctively, I reached for my true form, and almost screamed as I felt something twist inside me, power fighting power. I broke out in a cold sweat as I pushed it back down again. No. Not now. Maybe there was a way, but trying it when I was mentally exhausted was just stupid. I'd stay like this right now. Maybe I'd stay like this for the rest of my life, confined to an imitation human body. Trapped. And not sure it was better than being dead._

_I'd become a parody of a dragon. And I was all that was left. None of the others would have resorted to this. They'd have had the courage to die with dignity._

_Slowly I crumpled to my knees. Slowly, my hands curled into fists. But my eyes stayed dry as sand._

_Sometime during the night, I'd forgotten how to cry._

I hiccuped as I woke, but didn't try to open my eyes. Somehow it just seemed like too much effort. I was lying in a bed, by the feel of it, and there were other people nearby. I listened to them breathing, and gradually picked out two series of exhalations, in different rhythms—one of them lighter and quicker, the other slow, deep, and steady. 

_Gaav, is that you?_

The words fell away into nothing, unheard. He was still blocking himself off. Tears stung my eyes. _What the hell is this?_ I asked myself savagely, but I felt salt water ooze from between my eyelids anyway. 

At some time between the desert and now, I'd remembered how to cry again. Or had all of that just been a dream? It had been so vivid, so real, that I had a hard time believing it. 

"Val . . ." Bare murmur of a voice, accompanied by someone brushing away my tears. A big hand, and warm. 

"You really do care about him, don't you?" A woman—Sylphiel? 

"So what if I do?" Someone shifted position, leather and wood creaking. 

"Does he know that you love him?" 

Absolutely silence, broken by a low growl. "If you _ever_ tell him that, I'm going to make sure no one ever finds enough of your fucking corpse to know what you died from. He's better off without me." 

"Even if he returns your feelings?" 

"He doesn't. And even if he did, what the fuck has he ever done to deserve being tied to someone like me? We're not even the same fucking species, and he doesn't need anything I have to offer. Plus, sooner or later, someone I've pissed off in the past is going to catch up with me, and I want him in the clear when that happens. Hellmaster's on that list, by the way, and Beastmaster too, just so that you understand how serious this is." 

"You want him safe." 

"Yeah, I want him safe. And happy. He may be the only person I've ever given a flying fuck about, and leaving is the only thing I can think of to do for him." 

I wanted . . . to hug him. To hug a _Dark Lord_. Because although his voice was level and calm, there was something about it that just struck me as so sad. 

_I'm not leaving you._ Four simple words. Just a few syllables. And there was part of me that wanted to force them out. But . . . he wanted me to leave, and I wanted to separate myself from him (didn't I?) And if it was what we both wanted, why should it hurt? But it did. Great Valwin, it did. I felt another tear spill out, and once more, Gaav wiping it away. This time, though, he didn't completely withdraw afterwards. Instead, he picked up my hand and laced our fingers together. I hated myself for feeling reassured by his touch. 

Xellos had told me once that Mazoku couldn't love. They could prefer one person over another, but it never went beyond that, into the deep layers of bonding that mortals needed for survival, cooperation, and reproduction. But apparently Gaav was different. He should have wanted to use me for all I was worth, or at least selfishly keep me beside him, but instead he was practically pushing me to safety. 

_I've been misjudging you, haven't I? All along._ I'd figured out that his feelings were real to some extent, but I hadn't imagined that they were that deep. Or that he was capable of self-sacrifice. 

I was the one who had been so very, incredibly selfish. Convincing myself that his feelings didn't matter. 

The tears were leaking out nonstop now. I could feel them running down my face. 

"Fuck, that must be some nightmare you're having." 

Shouldn't he have known that I was awake? Or had he blocked himself off so thoroughly that he couldn't even tell that much? 

"Everything's going to be fine." His hand stroked my hair. 

I wanted to snarl at him. No, everything was _not_ going to be fine. 

I wasn't going to let him break our bond. I wanted him to stay. No matter what it did to the rest of my life. I could feel all those possibilities trickling away along with the tears. 

It was weird, realizing that this trip with him had been the best few weeks of my life. Hellmaster, brass demons, zombie ships, all that ugly crap . . . and yet, I hadn't cut myself since that night on the Troll's Fist, and the scars on my wrists were long-healed and even beginning to fade, underneath their wrappings. I felt . . . anchored, inside. Like the universe made sense. There was still guilt, but the feeling of being overwhelmed and suffocated was gone. There was a big difference between _I'm a horrible person and I don't even understand why_ and _I'm a horrible excuse for a dragon who consorts with Mazoku_. One was a choice. The other was just a nebulous feeling that I didn't know how to get rid of. 

Maybe if I let him go, the suffocated feeling wouldn't creep back. But maybe it would. He was the one who'd helped me get this far. 

_I . . . need you?_

I wasn't sure. But I needed to find out . . . and that was the thought I took down into the darkness with me as I fell asleep again.


	20. Chapter 19

I woke up with a disgusting taste in my mouth and the sound of snoring rumbling in my ears. As I propped myself on my elbows, I realized that I also stank of sweat, with an unfamiliar sour tang underlying it. The whole room reeked. 

The snoring was coming from Gaav, who was sitting in a chair beside the bed. He looked tired despite already being asleep. 

The room itself was small and spare, furnished with the bed, a few shelves, and two chairs. There was also a curtained window. I couldn't see much outside except a slice of tree, but from the angle of the light, it had to be either morning or evening. 

It was a typical inn room, anyway, but I didn't remember getting here, unless that messy, jumbled impression of Gaav carrying me had been real. I did remember eating lunch. And coughing up blood, and Gaav swearing as he talked about dragonsbane. Come to think of it, dragonsbane was supposed to taste good—to dragons, anyway. Maybe that was why I'd liked that lunch so much. 

"I want a bath," I said out loud, wrinkling my nose. 

Gaav's eyes flickered open. "You're in no condition to go to the bathhouse, so we'll have to have them bring a tub up. In a bit. It's still pretty early. Or I can carry you down, I guess." 

I swallowed. Well. We were alone, and putting it off wouldn't make it any easier. "Why are you . . ." 

"Hmm?" 

_Just go for it._ "You're blocking yourself off from me. Here." I tapped my temple with a finger, and nearly fell to the bed. Evidently I needed both elbows to support me right now. "Why?" 

"Because it makes it easier not to be too fucking selfish." Half-spoken, half-growled. "I want you safe only a little more than I want you with me. It'll be easier to give you your freedom if I don't tempt myself." 

"What if I told you I didn't want to be free?" 

" _Val._ " A definite growl now. "My patience has limits. And I don't like being teased." 

"And just who said I was teasing?!" I snapped. "I—you—damn it—" 

Without warning, the door swung open. "Oh, good, you're awake! I brought . . . breakfast . . ." The princess' voice trailed off as she looked at us. "This is a bad time, isn't it?" 

"It's too late now, so you might as well come in," I said. 

"I'm sorry. But I'm glad to see you're feeling better. Do you think you could eat something?" 

I considered. My stomach still wasn't exactly settled, but I didn't think I was bleeding internally anymore. "Something light, maybe. Fruit or soup. Tea." 

Princess Amelia nodded. "I had them make you some applesauce, just in case. Do you . . . think you can manage on your own?" 

To my humiliation, I couldn't. Even after Gaav propped me up with some pillows, I couldn't keep a reliable grip on the spoon. My fingers felt like sausages. I had to endure being fed by Amelia while the Dark Lord watched, and somehow the way he _wasn't_ smirking at me made it worse. 

"Would you quit _staring_?" I snarled at him about midway through the bowl. 

"Fine. I'm done, anyway, and it looks like you're past the crisis stage, so it should be safe to leave you alone to rest." He set aside the now-empty plate Amelia had brought up for him—pancakes and bacon, lucky bastard—and left the room. 

My hand twitched. I curled it into a weak, shaking fist. I was _not_ going to reach out toward where the last of his hair was just disappearing. It would just make me look like a fool. And anyway, there was no way we'd be able to continue the conversation we'd been having in front of a witness. 

"He really does care about you, you know," Princess Amelia said softly. "He insisted on being the one to sit up with you, all night, even though the rest of us offered to take shifts." 

I snorted. "If he cared a little less, maybe he'd stop trying to push me away." Although really, it was as much my fault as his. If not more. I was the one who had asked him to find a way to break the stupid bond. 

I wished I could go back in time and kick the me of only a few weeks ago. 

"Um, I feel kind of embarrassed about asking, but . . . this isn't just a brotherly thing for you, is it?" 

I flushed. "I . . . don't know. I think . . . I'd be happy enough without that, as long as he was still around . . . but sometimes . . . And why am I talking about this with _you_ , anyway?" 

"Because I asked, probably. And because you're having a hard time talking about it with him, aren't you? He doesn't want to hear what you have to say. Open wide, we've got another half a bowl to go." 

I obediently let her feed me a spoonful of applesauce, seething at the indignity of it all . . . and then just about snorted it back out through my nose when little miss princess added, "He's a dragon, isn't he?" 

"What makes you say that?" 

She blinked blue eyes at me. "I don't know. Other than the fact that he seems to know a lot about how dragons fly. And he lifted you so easily. And he . . . _feels_ a bit strange. I don't know how to put it, other than that. There's a kind of a weight to him. Not all the time, but when he forgets to try to hide it. The only people I've known who were like that were both golden dragon elders . . . except that neither of them ever tried to hide what they were." 

_Lie,_ I told myself. It was the only thing I could do right now if I didn't want them to discover his secret. _Why does that matter now?_ If we didn't need Sylphiel's help anymore . . . but the pause was starting to draw out too long. 

"He's a black, not a golden," I said. "And I don't think he was ever an elder. More like an outcast. He doesn't talk about it much, and he goes to a fair amount of trouble to keep a low profile." 

Amelia shook her head. "It sounds almost like he's a criminal. But if he's already paid for his crimes—or if being exiled is his punishment—then it would be unjust for us to interfere, and he doesn't _seem_ evil . . . He's the only other dragon you've ever met, isn't he? Besides Filia, I mean." 

I nodded—and nearly got hit in the nose by a spoonful of applesauce. If I wasn't well enough to feed myself when lunchtime rolled around, I was going to skip the meal, I decided. Or lie on my stomach and lap up food like a dog. Even that would be better than this. "So what?" 

"I guess I'm saying that . . . maybe you should meet some other dragons before you settle on him." 

"And now you sound like Filia. I may not have broken three digits yet, but I'm old enough to know what I want, and being tucked away in some dragon enclave to moulder doesn't figure into it." The scars on the insides of my wrists throbbed. They hadn't done that in a while. 

"You might not be the only dragon that feels that way." 

I growled, startling myself. "Why is it that everyone assumes they know what's best for me when they really know nothing about me? The biggest difference between Ga-vin and you—" I'd almost forgotten about his alias and said _Gaav_. Droplets of sweat ran down my back. "—isn't that he's a dragon. It's that he respects my choices." When I was able to articulate them, anyway. "He doesn't treat me like a hatchling, and he doesn't _pity_ me." _That_ was what it was, the vague hint of a sour note that I sensed underlying my every interaction with Zelgadis and the princess. Pity. Like they thought there was something wrong with me. Like they knew. About my wrists. About the darkness sloshing around inside me. 

One thing Gaav had never, ever done was pity me. Tease me, yes. Goad me, oh yes. But he'd never treated me like I was broken. Even though he knew everything. 

If I stuck with him, the rest of my life was going to be about fighting, and running, and hiding . . . but was that really so bad? I'd been kind of enjoying the travelling, at least when it didn't involve horses. Or boats. Enough new things that it didn't get stale, and if you screwed up dealing with someone, well, by the time you came back through the area, five or fifty or five hundred years later, they'd have forgotten all about you. If they were even still alive. 

Distractions. Companionship. I needed both. The possibility of accidentally saving the world by keeping the Chaos Dragon reined in was just a bonus. 

I had a future. What a weird idea. _I_ had a _future_ that I might actually be able to look forward to. Assuming we all survived the next few days. And that I could convince a stubborn Dark Lord to let me stay with him. 

I forced myself to complete the humiliating ritual of eating the rest of the applesauce. Fortunately, Amelia didn't try to engage me in any further conversation, or at least not anything that went beyond, "Open wide." I guess she had some thinking of her own to do. 

Afterwards, I was going to plead exhaustion and pretend to go back to sleep until she left, except that I heard the sound of someone else's footsteps in the hallway as she was gathering things back onto her tray. Familiar footsteps. _When did I start to recognize those?_

Gaav entered the room without knocking. Mind you, the door wasn't completely shut. "They won't bring a tub up, but they do have a private bathhouse out back," he said without preamble. "Question is, can you walk, or do I have to carry you after all?" 

I scowled and tried to push myself into a sitting position. I knew I was going to have to be carried, but my pride wouldn't let me say it. Instead, I forced my legs off the side of the mattress and tried to put some weight on them. 

I would have pitched face-down onto the floor if Gaav hadn't caught me. "Idiot," he said, and lifted me effortlessly into his arms. 

Amelia, who had her tray together now, paused on her way to the door. "You know, if Val hadn't already admitted you were a dragon, Gavin-san, that would have made me guess it." 

"Val talks too much sometimes," Gaav grumbled. Meanwhile, I was repressing my instinctive desire to fight my way out of a princess carry. Okay, I knew that being sick was never dignified, but I'd never expected it to be _this_ bad. Hopefully I'd at least be able to piss on my own, when the time came. For now, I tried to think of something to say that wasn't either totally inane or likely to touch off another Shinma War. 

"Did you ever find out who added dragonsbane to my lunch?" I asked at last, when we were halfway down the back stairs. 

"Sort of. The restaurant had hired a guy on for the day when one of their regular workers got sick, and he wasn't supposed to do anything but stir sauces and shit like that. Then they fired him about ten minutes after they brought your plate out, when he upended an entire pot of gravy. Which turned out to have dragonsbane in it. We'll never catch the guy, but it's pretty obvious what happened. Especially since he left us a little present." 

"Oh?" 

"Another rat skull with Ruby-Eye's sigil. Almost makes me sorry for the poor fucker who embosses the things." 

I had to admit that it didn't sound like a fun job. "I'd hate to be one of the rats even more," I said, knowing that it was a bit on the inane side. 

Gaav snorted and shifted his grip on me as we reached the bottom of the stairs, so that he could open a door. "If you were one of those rats, you would have sunk your teeth so deep into whoever tried to kill you for your skull that he'd be short a thumb, little dragon. You've always been a fighter." 

"Ancient dragons are supposed to be pacifists, so that isn't exactly a positive quality," I pointed out. 

"Only because your ancestors were idiots." We stepped outside for a moment and crossed the inn's back courtyard. The bathhouse was of the single-tub variety, with no stove or water pump of its own, so non-sorcerers would have to haul water from the well in buckets—via the kitchen if they wanted it hot. Gaav just waved his hand and filled the tub with hot water, which was even more efficient than the Aqua Create-Fireball routine I normally used. He waved it again, and my clothes vanished. I was too tired to wonder where they'd gone as he set me in the tub. I had to admit that the hot water felt good. 

The Dark Lord handed me soap and a washcloth. "I figure I'll leave you for a bit to wash up. Don't fall asleep in the tub." 

I offered him a crooked grin. "Have I ever?" 

The Dark Lord snorted. "Fuck, you outright fainted on me once! I had to fish you out of the water and hit you until you came to. Not the way I meant to spend the evening after _that_ battle, let me tell you! Especially given how pissed off you were at me for giving you a fat lip." 

I snickered. "It's standard among mortals to assume that if the person doesn't respond to being shaken or lightly slapped, there's probably something that needs medical attention. I can't believe that you're . . . however many thousand years old . . . and didn't know that." 

"I knew there wasn't any deeper problem. You were just—" And then he stopped in mid-sentence. 

"And that's another thing that pisses me off," I said. "When are you going to stop _hiding_ this stuff from me?" 

"When I'm sure you won't turn back into the fucking idiot who was just looking for a place to die. Wash up, little dragon. I'll be back in about ten minutes." 

I couldn't even grab onto him and stop him from leaving. Without the swirling skirts of his coat, no part of him was within arm's reach, and I was too weak to stand up. Cursing, I sat there like a good little hatchling and began to lather up the bar of soap he'd handed me, hoping that he'd hear what I was saying about him. Although he'd shut the door firmly behind him, I somehow didn't think he'd gone far. He might even be leaning against the outside wall. 

_Looking for a place to die._ Was that what the old me had really been doing? I scowled at the bar of soap. I didn't like puzzles to begin with, and this time the puzzle was _me_ and I was sick of it. I wanted answers, and I didn't really care if the content was nasty and depressing. 

_Why am I even alive?_

I'd long since stopped believing even for a second that Filia-mama had really found my egg locked in a stasis spell. Not if I'd been actively bound to Gaav at the moment of his temporary death twenty-odd years ago. 

I think I'd always suspected a little bit. I mean, it wasn't a very probable story. It was just that I hadn't been able to come up with any alternative that wasn't even more ridiculous. Now . . . well. I was starting to think that I'd voluntarily stuffed myself into an egg somehow, using magic that I no longer remembered. Maybe I'd been trying to keep myself from getting killed—Gaav's enemies probably would have wanted my head, given half a chance. 

Or maybe I'd just been so lonely after he'd died that starting over had felt like a good idea. 

Well, it wasn't as though speculating about it was going to do me any good. Not unless I wanted to try another meditation-probe of that point in my psyche where the bond that linked me to Gaav was anchored, and I wasn't so fuzzy that I couldn't see why that might not be such a good idea in a bathtub. It would be better to get back to bed first. 

I wasn't strong enough to hold my arms up for long enough to wash my hair properly, but I managed to at least rinse it, and I was resting, leaning against the edge of the tub, when the door opened again. 

"You awake?" the raspy voice, so different from his real one, asked. 

"Yeah," I said, forcing my eyes open again. 

"Good." A wave of his hand made the water disappear, leaving both my skin and the tub bone dry. Convenient. Like so many other things he could do with his power, without having to articulate a spell. I was starting to feel really jealous about that. 

Another little gesture and I was dressed, in loose cotton drawstring trousers and a robe. Both even had the soft, slightly-worn feeling of being well-lived-in. 

"You could have cleaned me and the entire room with just a hand-wave, couldn't you?" I said. 

"Yeah, but how would we explain that to our little friends? And besides, you told me once that you never _felt_ clean unless you went through the whole water-and-soap routine." He picked me up again, and I snuggled against his chest, without really meaning to. I was so very tired. 

"Y'won't leave, will you?" I mumbled. We needed to talk about that, I knew we did, but I didn't have the energy right now. 

"Not yet, little dragon. Not yet." 

And I had to be content with that, for now.


	21. Chapter 20

In the end, it was Gaav, taking on the form of a black dragon, who flew us through the mountains. I sat on his back with the chimera and the two humans, wrapped in a cocoon of blankets to keep me from getting chilled . . . which wasn't strictly necessary, and I'd put up a token argument, but I was still pretty tired. We ate lunch in a foothill town on the Lyzeille side, and this time we all ordered the same thing and Zelgadis ate first, since he'd lost the Rock-Paper-Scissors session that I wasn't allowed to participate in. And we tested everything with vinegar, just in case. And again when we stopped for the night, about ten miles from Sairaag at a tiny inn that only had one guest room. With four beds, none of them large enough to fit Gaav. He slept on the floor, right in front of the door where anyone coming in would have to step on him. 

It felt . . . oddly familiar, being that paranoid. Comforting, almost. We'd probably had to take heavy precautions all the time in the old days that I didn't remember, although they might not have taken quite this form. I slept well that night, although I might have been the only mortal in the room that did, and woke feeling pretty much myself again, without any lingering debilitation from the dragonsbane. 

The next morning dawned grey and cloudy. Low clouds, the heavy kind that look like they're going to split open and rain at any moment. We flew most of that last ten miles inside a blanket of fog, where everything was dim and muffled . . . and cold and wet. While I couldn't see far enough to check, I would have bet that moisture was running across the membranes of Gaav's wings, only to be flicked off into the clouds. I've never liked flying on that kind of day, and I'd been glad enough to give the chore over to him. 

Dipping below cloud level at the end of the flight, we found . . . nothing unusual. Sairaag wasn't exactly celebrating or anything, but there seemed to be a normal level of morning activity going on, with people moving about in the streets. Gaav circled the edge of the living city, high enough up that his shadow wouldn't be noticed on a dim day like this, but there was no evidence of Hellmaster anywhere. 

We landed among ruins—the ruins of Old New Sairaag, I thought, the city that Rezo had destroyed, with some wooden walls still standing, although in an advanced state of mossy decay. I glanced at Sylphiel as we got down off Gaav's back, and saw her mouth tighten. She might even have been able to name the street. 

When they'd rebuilt the city _again_ after Hellmaster had been through, they hadn't done so on quite the same site, choosing to move about fifteen degrees clockwise around what had once been the base of Flagoon. They'd taken dressed stone from the old city to construct the new, though, so I guess they weren't that afraid of stirring up ghosts. The last stretch of road before the gates passed between the still-visible foundations of buildings that had been razed to the ground. 

The wall enclosing New New Sairaag was oddly perfunctory, only about six feet high. Very strange. The gate guards didn't even ask us who we were or what our business was before waving us straight through. 

"That wouldn't be much protection if anything happened," Gaav said, gesturing over his shoulder as we looked around, trying to decide on a street to follow. 

"Walls didn't stop Copy Rezo or Hellmaster, so the city council decided that building proper ones was just a waste of money," Sylphiel explained. She'd told us before that she still had friends living in the city, and they passed letters back and forth a few times a year. "These ones are high enough to keep anyone from smuggling much of anything into the city to get past the toll on carts, and make life a bit more difficult for criminals, and that's all they care about." 

"So what do we do now?" I asked. I mean, we'd been expecting there to be _some_ evidence of what was going on here, and now that we'd arrived and found a peaceful city, I was a bit at a loss. 

"Wait a minute." Gaav narrowed his eyes, and a subtle pressure developped around him for the moment, although I might have been the only one close enough to notice. "That way. Somewhere. Not especially close. It might be outside the city proper." He pointed in a direction that—of course—didn't really match any of the streets. 

"Um, are you sure?" Princess Amelia asked. 

Gaav snorted. "If there's one thing I know all about, it's Mazoku energy. There's something over there that stinks of Hellmaster, and it isn't in the direction of Flagoon, which I understand is where Lina Inverse took him down. But you don't have to take my word for it. Val?" 

I tried to feel around on the astral, which would have been a lot easier if I'd been in a trance, and caught a trace of _stench-of-rotting-meat_ , just as subjective as Gaav's wool-blanket feeling or Xellos' lump of slime. "There's something there," I said with a grimace, and added to Gaav, "You could have warned me. Feels like I'm kissing a zombie." Now that I was aware of Hellmaster or whatever, it seemed that there was no way of getting _un_ -aware. 

"Sorry, little dragon." 

I scowled. "And for the umpteenth time, I am _not little_!" 

"Let's just pick a street," Zelgadis said. 

We went with the wide one leading straight away from the gate, although if it stayed straight, the rotting-meat was going to end up off on our left somewhere. 

The further we got, the fewer people there were, and the less they lingered in the streets. I wasn't the only one who noticed that, either. Zelgadis' hand drifted closer and closer to his sword as we walked along, and the girls tensed up. Gaav scowled, but he often did that. Didn't it seem to be getting darker? Or . . . foggy? Just a little bit, but enough to dim the sun. 

"There's a barricade up ahead," Zelgadis said. And so there was, three wooden carts set end-to-end across the street, reinforced by sandbags and sawhorses. Beyond it, there was a grey wall of fog. And it was guarded. As we got closer, the guards converged on us. 

"I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to ask you to turn back," one of them began, and then, squinting under the edge of her helmet. "Wait, you're . . . Sylphiel?" 

Sylphiel blinked, apparently going through an internal catalogue of faces. " . . . Nara?" 

The guardswoman smiled. "It's been a long time. What brings you back to Sairaag after all these years? 

"That," Sylphiel said firmly, pointing across the barricade. "The Flagoon sapling in Seyruun warned me that something was happening here. I couldn't just stay away." 

I couldn't say she was lying. For all I knew, she might really talk to trees, and the information we'd brought had just given her a clearer picture of what was going on. 

"Do you know what's going on?" Nara sounded pretty eager. "All we know is that, starting from a few days ago, people who go too far in that direction don't ever seem to come back again. Since it doesn't seem to be spreading or anything, the town council decided to just blockade it for now until they can get someone in from the capital. You would think they'd know better . . ." 

"You've got a Mazoku infestation," I said. I didn't think there was a point in hiding it. "One that we've tracked halfway across the world." That was an exaggeration, but not as much of one as the guards might think. 

The guardswoman's face went white when she heard the word "Mazoku". "And you're here to fight . . . that?" 

"And we're here to fight that," I agreed. 

"I was with Lina Inverse when she took down part of Shabranigdo, and when she faced Gaav and Hellmaster," Zelgadis added. "Believe me, we know exactly what kind of risk we're taking." 

"And you don't have anything to lose by letting us through," Gaav added. "But if you leave whatever's over there alone for too long, things _will_ start coming back out of that—" He waved his hand at the fog bank. "—and you can bet your ass they won't be anything as harmless as the people who went in and disappeared. Even though they might look like them, at first." 

That certainly threw a damper over the conversation. I wondered if Gaav was feeding off the grimness in the air. After all, that was what Mazoku did. 

A memory of a taste like persimmons ghosted across my tongue. I forced myself to ignore it. If I did stay with Gaav, with the bond intact, that kind of thing was going to happen now and again, and I needed to get used to it. 

Nara chewed her lower lip for a moment before saying, "Okay. You'd better get across before the lieutenant comes by to inspect. We'll pretend we didn't see anything—right, boys?" 

"Right, Corporal." 

"Got it." 

"If we must." 

Nara nodded to us. Amelia had already hopped up on top of the barrier. 

"This fog really _is_ thick," she said. "I can't see more than about ten feet. I don't think anything's moving." 

Gaav and I jumped up too, while Zelgadis boosted Sylphiel. On the other side of the carts, the fog thickened rapidly, and there seemed to be shadows moving through it—had Amelia missed those, or were they something a human couldn't see? 

" _Diem Wind,_ " I said crisply, and threw the spell. 

The fog didn't shift. I could have tried a Bomb di Wind, which was more powerful, but I was willing to bet it would have the same effect. 

"That isn't just fog," I said. 

"Of course not," Gaav replied. "Did you really think it would be that fucking easy? See that shit wiggling around inside? That fog _is_ a Mazoku, a shadow-and-concealment type. No real offensive power and only dog-level intelligence, but you don't want to try breathing it." 

"So we're going to have to keep casting Ray Wing the whole time we're in there?" Zelgadis said. He already looked tired. 

"I'll handle it," Gaav said, and added a word in a language I didn't recognize. What formed up around us wasn't a conventional wind-wall like the one Ray Wing created, but a thin layer of subtle, shimmering red fog that pushed the other fog back. "Don't get too far away," the Dark Lord added, and jumped off the barricade on the far side. I followed right away, and the humans came down after. 

We all kept a lookout as we began to move forward. With the fog Mazoku pushed out of the way, it just looked like a normal city street. Well, okay, a normal very vacant city street. Nothing moved except us and the fog. 

We'd covered about a block when the world outside our protective barrier suddenly . . . _rippled_ , is the best way I can put it. Gaav scowled, Zelgadis reached for his sword, and Amelia raised her fists. My palms tingled, but I didn't pull my dual swords out of nothing. I would wait until Gaav drew his sword, or until I spotted something that I might actually be able to fight that way. 

"Feels like a dimensional interface," the Dark Lord rumbled. "Or a fold in space, but I'd bet on the other." 

"Then what's on the other side?" Princess Amelia asked. 

"Fucked if I know, beyond the fact that it isn't going to be Sairaag. We'll have to actually cross it to find out." 

"Then what are we waiting for?" I asked. 

"Patience, little dragon. I need everyone to understand that once we're in, it might be tough to get out, especially if we get separated. If it is another dimension, I doubt it's going to be the kind of bubble you can pop with a summoning spell." 

"You lied about how good you are at magic, didn't you?" the princess asked. 

Gaav snorted. "Of course I did. I've got all of the Dark Lords actively after my ass, and you've been known to hang out with Beastmaster's chief lackey—do you think I'm going to give away more than I absolutely have to? I'm not suicidal." 

"What did you _do_?" Sylphiel asked, sounding almost plaintive. 

"I have to admit that I've never heard of a mortal _survive_ making them all angry enough to actively try to stamp him out," Zelgadis said. "Lina only got away with making a couple of them angry individually because they didn't really take her seriously until it was too late." 

"It's none of your fucking business what I did. All you need to know is that right now, getting rid of that last bit of Hellmaster increases my chances of long-term survival by a few percent. So until he's dead, there's no way I would _not_ be on your side. But if it makes you feel better, we can show you out again and Val and I will continue on alone." 

"You seem awfully certain that he's going to go with you," the chimera said. 

"That's because I _am_ going with him," I said firmly. Why would I want to refuse? This was what we'd been working towards. 

"Val . . ." The princess had a note in her voice that was . . . almost pitying. I didn't like it. "You really don't have to do this. You should . . . you deserve to live a peaceful life." 

I gave her a cold look. "Why in hell would I want to?" 

She blinked several times. I guess I'd startled her. "No . . . particular reason, I guess," she said, her expression turning thoughtful. "I suppose we all assumed that that was what you wanted. Which wasn't right. Or just." 

I knew from Filia-mama's stories how much the concept of _justice_ meant to this woman, so I just nodded and turned away. Come to think of it, Filia-mama must have been one of the people making those assumptions. Hell, _I'd_ been making that assumption, implicitly, for most of my life . . . but I'd begun to figure out what I really wanted now. Thanks to Gaav. 

"I don't think any of us are going to back out now," Zelgadis was saying. "Although doing this kind of thing with Lina was easier than doing it with a pair of grumpy dragons." He took a couple of steps forward, then stopped again when our protection didn't move with him. "Can we go now?" 

Instead of answering in words, Gaav began to move forward again, walking with his usual long, easy stride, giving no sign of anxiety. I followed him, and the humans spread out behind us. 

Three steps, and everything outside our protective barrier wavered again and became . . . an ordinary city street, illuminated by moon- and lamplight. 

"I thought you said this wasn't going to be Sairaag," Zelgadis said. 

"It isn't," Gaav rumbled. "Or at least, not the real Sairaag." 

I heard a gasp from behind me and turned to discover that Sylphiel was white-faced and shaking. "This . . . this _is_ Sairaag," she said. "But not today's Sairaag. You see . . . that shop sign there . . . and that one . . ." She pointed, first at a hanging signboard that read _Three Corners Bakery_ , then at a plaque beside a door that read _Stinson and Truefell, Barristers_. "I recognize them. They were in the part of the city that was destroyed by Copy Rezo. And I wouldn't be surprised . . . to find that people had . . . that the ghosts of my father and other people I once knew are wandering around in here. Just as Hellmaster did the first time he invaded our city." She shivered for a moment. Then she set her jaw and her hands tightened into fists. "I thought they'd gone free after Hellmaster was defeated. And I'm not going to let him use them again." 

" _Is_ there anyone here, though? There aren't any lights in the windows, and it's really quiet," I pointed out. 

Gaav snorted. "You think he set all of this up for nothing, little dragon? No, there's someone here. Someone other than us." He could probably taste them, although I understood why he didn't want to say so. "Might just be the fucking idiots that guard mentioned who wandered into the area, though. We can always try breaking into a few of the buildings if anyone thinks it's important—although if you ask me, it'd just be a waste of time." 

"We could end up wasting a lot more time if we just wander around the city at random," Zelgadis pointed out. 

"There has to be some kind of central area," I said. "Sylphiel?" 

The priestess closed her eyes. "I think . . . maybe . . . the square in front of the town hall. Or I could try a divination." 

"Only if you're a fucking idiot. You'd just get whatever shit the creator of this place _wants_ you to get, _and_ you'd attract his attention. He shouldn't know we're here yet, and I'd prefer to keep it that way." 

"So we'll try the square by the town hall," I interposed. "Sylphiel, which way is that?" 

The priestess pointed, and we began to walk again. 

Three blocks later, we spotted someone leaning against a lamppost. Sylphiel gave a cry and began to run forward, and Gaav cursed and canceled the red mist barrier that had surrounded us up to this point before the priestess could run into it. Zelgadis and Amelia began to run after her, and I would have followed if Gaav hadn't suddenly reached out and grabbed me by the shoulder. 

"Stay alert. Something isn't quite right, and if we're not careful it might end up biting us on the ass." 

I nodded, and moved forward with him at a more sedate pace. 

The figure by the lamppost seemed to be paying no attention to any of us. When Sylphiel reached out to touch it, her hand went right through its shoulder, and she jerked back with a cry. 

"A ghost?" I took a half-step backwards. I'd never heard of a human ghost being able to possess a dragon, but I'd also never had the chance to learn about ghosts from the dragon point of view. 

Gaav shook his head. "Not really. Real ghosts are aware of their surroundings, but I'd bet you could drop an anvil on—or through—this fucker without getting a reaction." 

"Rilmayla," Zelgadis said. Or at least, I was pretty sure it was something like that. Probably an elven word, from the sound of it. 

"Might be," was Gaav's equally cryptic reply. "Closer to that than anything else, anyway." 

It was the princess who asked, "What's a Ril . . . mayla?" 

"Something mentioned in one of Rezo's books," the chimera said. "It's . . . more like the memory of a soul than a real ghost. A projected memory. Sometimes they move around, repeating something they did in life. They're harmless—just images. You can't touch them, and they can't touch you. They're also very easily disrupted by magic, which is why you hardly ever see one." 

"Then this is . . ." Sylphiel gave the figure—this close, I could identify it as a man dressed in ordinary clothes, the kind a clerk or craftsman might wear—a sad look. 

"It's a memory that fucker Phibby stole from someone," Gaav said impatiently. "And we're not going to learn anything by staring at it, or be able to find the soul and put it to rest. Plus, I doubt it's the nastiest thing we're going to find here, even if Phibby's severely weakened. Let's go." 

It wasn't the last such figure we saw. In fact, more and more of them started to show up as we approached the town hall—walking, loitering, even selling stuff. The moving ones appeared out of the dark, then vanished back into it. All of them had a slight transparency to them that you could see when you looked for it. 

"This is fucking pathetic," Gaav said as the sad throng of not-ghosts began to thicken up. "Phibby used to be able to pseudo-resurrect souls that he captured and give them solid bodies—although if you cut one of those bodies in half, you'd find some kind of weird sludge inside instead of bones and such, so you couldn't say they were really _alive_. Still, it was several levels above this. It's like he's wiggling his fingers to cast shadows on a wall for little kids." 

Princess Amelia forced a smile. "I have to admit, he looked like a 'Phibby'. Until he . . ." She trailed off in mid-sentence, and Zelgadis laid a hand on her arm. 

"It's what he does," Gaav said. "Act small and harmless until it suits his purposes to do otherwise. He used to be able to wipe out a lot of troops by playing the 'help me, I'm a little lost kid!' card. Nasty little fucker." 

"During the Kouma War?" Zelgadis asked. 

"Before he got stuck holding the barrier, yeah. During the Shinma War too . . . or so I've heard." 

I hoped I was the only one who recognized that as an attempt to cover up a near-slip. While there might still be a handful of dragons here and there who remembered the last few years of the Shinma War, they would be ancient among our kind. And Gaav looked like he was no more than middle-aged, even in his current form. 

"Those two rilmayla just overlapped," Princess Amelia said, pointing. 

"They don't have any substance, so why the fuck shouldn't they?" 

"No reason, I guess . . ." The princess was frowning. "You know . . ." 

"If you're searching for a diplomatic way of saying I'm fucking rude and abrasive . . . don't bother. I know what I am, and being _polite_ never got me anything. Shit, what's this wall doing here?!" Gaav glared at the offending arrangement of bricks, which was about three feet from his nose. 

"It's the side wall of the yard of an inn that faces onto the back of the square," Sylphiel said. "We have to go left, then take the first turn to the right." She pointed at a lamppost which was, as she'd said, to the left. And there was light spilling down the cross-street, as though someone had set up some torches in the square. 

That meant that Princess Amelia, who happened to be leftmost, reached the corner half a step before anyone else. It also meant that I nearly ran into her back when she froze, then started to back up, shaking her head. I muttered a curse and dodged around her. 

Then I saw what was up ahead, and my foot hesitated jerkily for a moment before coming down to complete the step I was taking. 

Okay, so the square in front of the town hall was set up for a festival, with booths and crap like that. That part was no big deal. The problem was the festival-goers. Not rilmayla this time. No, these were a lot more solid. I couldn't even tell what was wrong with them at first, except that something about the atmosphere gave me the creeps. 

Then I took a better look at the raised platform in the middle of the square. _Oh._

The platform had a pyramid of bodies piled in the middle of it. And by bodies, I mean _corpses_. Now that my attention had been drawn to it, I could faintly smell the rotting meat. No flies, but maybe there weren't any here. 

I looked quickly back at the people moving around. Not dead, but not quite right, either. They weren't looking at the platform, and even the laughing ones had something about them that told me they were screaming inside. Plus, the stalls, and the stuff they were selling . . . it seemed okay when I looked straight at it, but out of the corners of my eyes I got the impression of rot and decay and wear. Tattered stuffed animals with stuffing spilling out of them, and little lumps of food so shriveled up it was hard to tell what they'd originally been. _Ugh._

"I flatter myself that they're quite lifelike." 

I snapped my swords out of my private pocket dimension as I turned, my hands automatically locking them together to form the longer, double-bladed weapon I'd been drilling with for the past few weeks. Gaav had his sword out too, and Zelgadis. Sylphiel had stepped back behind us, and Amelia had her fists up. 

The man who had spoken was blonde and golden-eyed, with the slit pupils of a dragon or a Mazoku. His hair was gathered into a sort of tail near his left ear, obscuring that side of his face. He smiled and held out his hands, showing that he wasn't holding a weapon, for whatever that was worth. 

"Welcome to my domain," he added.


	22. Chapter 21

"You're no dragon," Gaav said. "And I get the feeling I should recognize you." 

"What if I told you I was Hellmaster?" 

Gaav barked a laugh. "If you're going to try to pull my leg, you should at least do a better job than that. Hellmaster wouldn't have created a third-rate setup like this. And he would recognize me. But he wouldn't know shit about Val, because he's never cared about anyone's minions—not even his own. You're just a minion he picked up somewhere. Probably the one who fed Val that dragonsbane." 

There was that odd smile again. "You're correct. I am the master of nothing, not even myself." 

"Anyway, we're not here to have a conversation," I said, thrusting the weapon in my hands in the blonde man's direction. "We're here for Hellmaster. Where is he?" 

"I don't think I'm going to tell you." 

"You will." Gaav's grin was sharp and nasty. "Sooner or later. For your own sake, make it sooner." 

"For my own sake, I'm better not letting it happen at all. My apologies, O my lords and ladies." He offered us a slight bow, and smoothed his hair. 

"Parthus," Gaav said, his eyes narrowing. "Now everything makes sense—this is just the kind of shitty half-assed setup you always liked. Fake people, fake scenery, and fake deaths. What a fucking cop-out." 

"You know him?" Zelgadis said. 

"Yeah, unfortunately. Parthus was Phibby's General. He was supposed to have died when Ragradia caught him with his pants down in one of the minor battles of the Kouma War. Except that I guess she wasn't quite thorough enough. He must have found someone to parasitize for a while, since that's just about the only way he could have hidden from me." 

"Such harsh words," Parthus said, still smiling slyly. "But I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. You always did have a cutting tongue, although as I recall, you used to be less direct, Gaav-san." 

Zelgadis jerked, Amelia gasped, and Gaav . . . moved. His left arm shot forward in a blur, and he grabbed Parthus by the head, his hand spanning the entire top of the dragon-Mazoku's skull. 

"Think we're equals, do you?" he growled, in his own voice and not the raspy one of Gavin Rufous. "Fuck, what is it with you little rats? Do you really think I've lost that much of my power?" He threw Parthus toward the pile of corpses at the center of the square without waiting for an answer. The Dark Lord's body rippled, shifting back to what I thought of as his real humanform appearance, as he turned back toward the rest of us. 

Zelgadis pushed Sylphiel behind him, keeping his sword between himself and Gaav, who snorted and propped his larger blade against his shoulder. 

"I can guess what you want to say, but now isn't the time. If nothing else, I think you can believe killing the last vestige of that little shit Phibby is a hundred times more important to me than anything to do with mortals. We can talk about the rest later. Or, like I said before, you can leave, and Val and I will go on alone." 

The chimera seemed about to say something, but suddenly Gaav's eyes flashed red and purple fire splashed against a wedge-shaped barrier centered on him, which meant that it also missed the rest of us. 

" _Astral Vine!_ " Zelgadis snapped, and his blade flared red. 

"Looks like we're going to have to deal with Parthus before we can move on," Gaav rumbled. "Shouldn't be all that difficult. The little shit's only about half as strong as Xellos." 

"Easy for you to say," the chimera muttered. 

"He might not be all we have to deal with," I said grimly, because I'd just noticed that the festivalgoers who had been milling around the square and ignoring us up to this point had all frozen in place. I'd been half-expecting something like that to happen ever since we'd gotten here, but that didn't make it any less eerie when they all turned to face us, at exactly the same speed, at exactly the same moment . . . and with the same terrible expression in all their half-glazed eyes. 

"Well, I _do_ have to make sure that all of my guests are properly entertained!" Parthus' voice came from my left, but his next attack shot in from high on the right. He didn't fool Gaav, though. The Dark Lord blocked the bolt of crackling light with his extended left hand as he stabbed his sword down into nothing . . . into the astral, I guess, because the point disappeared. He pulled it out again almost immediately, and his entire body blurred as he headed for the pile of corpses at the center of the square. I didn't have time to stare, though. The zombies were coming. 

"Could any of these people still be alive?" Princess Amelia asked as she raised her fists. 

"And under some kind of mind control spell?" I said, turning slightly to put my back to the humans'. "I doubt it, but we could try a Flow Break, I guess. Sylphiel?" I knew the spell too, of course, and several other disenchanting spells that took too long to cast in the middle of a fight, but Sylphiel wasn't likely to be of much help with the physical part of this. 

"I'll try that. And Megido Flare," the priestess said with surprising firmness. "I don't know if it'll be enough, but we can't just leave them like this." 

"Just do it quickly!" I said as a "zombie" fanned my hair with a shovel he had snatched up from a display of tools. These were not slow, rotting corpses like those Gaav and I had run into on that Elmekian ship—they were fully as fast and agile as any live human, although (thankfully) few of them seemed trained to fight. 

I knocked the shovel out of my current opponent's hands with one end of my lance and gutted him with a slash of the other blade. What fell out and soaked his feet looked more like strawberry pudding than guts, and didn't smell like anything at all. 

So that one hadn't been alive. 

" _Flow Break!_ " 

Nothing happened. A mortal disspelling enchantment probably just wasn't strong enough. The zombie I'd gutted didn't seem to be falling over, so I decapitated it as well, just for good measure. That seemed to do it, and another one pushed forward. 

A kid. A little girl in a bright yellow dress trimmed with white ruffles. 

She looked like she was about eight years old, and there were tears streaming down her face, but whatever was running the rest of her body didn't seem to care. As I stared, appalled, she snatched up the shovel the other zombie had dropped and tried to break my arm with it. Even with her body using what amounted to hysterical strength, she wasn't strong enough to do that kind of damage to a dragon, though. I got a painful bruise, but that was it. 

"I'm sorry," I said as I brought my lance around. She smiled tremulously as the blade hit her neck. 

" _Fireball!_ " Zelgadis cast. "There's no end to them," he added. "Literally, I think, or at least I'd swear that some of the ones I've taken out are getting recycled." 

I nearly gagged. _Ceiphied_ , was I going to have to kill that poor little girl over and over again? The thought of torturing someone that way—she wouldn't even be able to scream—smell of blood thick in my nose, where was it coming from? None of us was hurt, and that strawberry pudding stuff didn't smell . . . didn't . . . Dragons falling from the sky, and flashes of power scything them down . . . 

I shook my head frantically. No, no, no! I didn't have time for hallucinations right now! Or . . . buried memories? Regardless, we were going to be overwhelmed by zombies if I didn't focus. 

Or possibly even if we did, but I had an idea. 

"Dark dragon, eternal flame of red, lend me your might that all who stand against me may perish! _Chaos Inferno!_ " 

This time I was ready for the massive influx of power, or maybe the first time had cleared away some obstacles inside my astral body. I was able to channel it and keep it from frying me inside. It hadn't occurred to me that I might also fry the humans who were standing behind me . . . but Zelgadis was quick off the mark with a protective spell and guided the fires around them. That protected the three of them (and also a handful of zombies that had gotten around behind, but you can't have everything). The rest of the plaza was scoured clean, right down to the stones. 

As the fires died away, Sylphiel's voice rang clear in the sudden silence. "You who are not of this world, pitiful, twisted creatures . . . By the light of the purity I possess, I bid you be gone to the nexus between our two worlds! _Megido Flare!_ " 

A column of white light rose around us, and the remaining zombies' bodies crumpled. 

Someone made an irritated noise. "Look at what you've done." A child's voice. _Hellmaster?_ "Now I'm going to have to put them all back together again." 

"You could just let them go," I said tentatively to the air in front of me, because I hadn't been able to localize the voice to a source. 

There was no reply, unless you consider an odd sensation of invisible pressure a reply. 

Over where the corpses, now ash, had been, a golden light was sparring with a red one. The two clashed, then separated, at times becoming nothing more than a blur. Gaav and Parthus, fighting . . . although I was oddly certain that Gaav could have ended it at any time. I didn't think he was playing with the lesser Mazoku—he wasn't that irresponsible—but I didn't understand what he was actually doing, either. 

One more pass, and the lights became figures, Parthus on his stomach on the charred pavement with his left arm twisted up behind his back by Gaav, who was kneeling astride him. At some point, Gaav had sheathed his sword, and the fingers of his free hand gripped the lesser Mazoku's hair. 

"Now," the Dark Lord said. "You're going to tell me everything you know, including why Phibby doesn't seem to be paying attention to what's going on. If you do a really good job, I might let you live." 

"Hellmaster won't be pleased with that," Parthus pointed out, then yelped as Gaav pulled on his hair. 

"I don't give a shit. Now. Talk." 

"About what— _ouch!_ " 

"Why you're stalling for time might be a good start," Gaav said. He had that familiar smirk on his face, but there was something . . . edged . . . about it. 

"That is a— _Aagh!_ " 

"Don't even _try_ that one on me, or I'll shred you and feed you to Dolphin's pet leviathan." Gaav had Parthus bent like a drawn bow, his spine curving the wrong way. "And if you don't start talking, I'm going to get _really_ nasty." 

"All right, all right! Phibrizzo-sama is . . . dreaming. And he's nowhere." 

A bushy eyebrow rose. "What the fuck is _that_ supposed to mean? I know he's around here somewhere—this entire place stinks of him, just as much as it stinks of you." 

"I mean he isn't conscious," Parthus said. "And maybe 'nowhere' isn't the right word. I could have said 'everywhere' and been just as truthful." 

Gaav's smirk became more of a genuine grin. "You mean you fucked up. Or your minion did. I'd been wondering what she thought she was doing, opening the jar like that." 

"It was a plan of last resort, one we had hoped never to use. We tried to make certain that if we did have to use it, Phibrizzo-sama would return to the largest other fragment of himself. And he did. But he lost a bit of himself along the way, or perhaps it never made it into that jar in the first place." 

Gaav shook him a bit. "I think I know what you're getting at, but spell it out." 

"He came to me, but he was dissipating around the edges. My attempts to stabilize him and infuse him with additional energy were successful to some extent, but he has been unable to resume a truly coherent form and is semiconscious at best. Currently, he . . . is the fabric of this dimension, or at least woven into it. I thought enticing additional humans in here for him to feed on might help, and I suppose it has. Those words were the first time he has spoken since he was freed." 

Parthus smiled brightly as Gaav began to swear, a mixture of words in languages I knew and ones that I didn't. He ended with a word in an old form of the dragon language whose final sound was a bone-vibrating deep growl. 

I understood why, too. How do you destroy a handful of sand? If it's still gathered together _as_ a handful, that's one thing—a tightly localized fire spell can blast it into glass slag. But if you spread it out in a layer one grain thick, it gets a lot harder to make sure you haven't missed a bit somewhere. 

Right now, we were dealing with a one-grain-thick layer of Hellmaster. And even worse, we were _inside_ him, so it would be difficult to cast a large-area spell that didn't affect us too. 

Even though they weren't there right now, I distinctly felt the scales at the back of my neck hackle as figures began to step out of the shadows at the edge of the square again. One of them was a little girl in a frilly yellow dress. 

I gritted my teeth and raised my weapon. This whole situation was horrific, but I hadn't come this far just to give up. If we bought enough time, Gaav would think of something. 

Wouldn't he?


	23. Chapter 22

I'd killed another eight or nine zombies—not the little girl again, thankfully—when the pile of bodies in the middle of the square went up in flames. After that, the walking dead began to thin out. Well, the fact that Gaav was swinging at them now helped, even though he was using one hand to keep a trussed-up Parthus from falling from his shoulder. 

This time, when the dead were cleared away, they didn't come back. There was a bench a few steps away, at the edge of what must have been a raised flowerbed in the real-world version of the square, and I sank down onto it gratefully. Fighting all-out without a break is tiring. 

When I managed to catch Gaav's eye, I asked, "What the hell just happened?" 

Gaav shrugged. "I told you before, I don't go in for this zombie shit . . . but I do know that with the more complicated reanimated types, the more ties to the world they have, the easier it is to keep them 'alive'. Burning the bodies got rid of one tie, and also of some of the negative emotions Phibby's been feeding off of. So they were draining more of his power without giving him nearly as much back, and he couldn't sustain them." 

"And now what?" I asked. 

"Fucked if I know. We go have a look at the town hall, I guess. There might be something there." 

I wondered if he really believed that . . . but at least it was a way forward. A direction to take. 

"We also need to figure out what to do with him," Zelgadis said, gesturing at Parthus. 

"Take him along," Gaav said. "He might end up being good for something—not sure what, but I don't want to close off any options prematurely by killing him." 

"Of course not," Princess Amelia said. "Even if you wanted to be that unjust, Val would hate you for it." 

Gaav snorted. "I doubt it, princess. Chimera, you carry him. If any more shit shows up, it's more important for me to have my hands free than you." 

"My _name_ is _Zelgadis_. _Not_ 'chimera'." But he picked up the thoroughly-trussed-up Mazoku anyway. 

We walked past the sad trappings of the festival, where the goods on display were now revealed as composed of trash and rot, and the brightly coloured stalls, as worn and faded. The fountain at the base of the steps leading up to the town hall proper was bone-dry, and the flowerbeds surrounding it were bare, like the one by the bench I'd sat on. Without the illusions and the fake festival-goers, the whole thing was less spooky than it was sad. 

What I didn't get was, why set up the illusions in the first place, when Hellmaster had to have created everything here that hadn't been brought in by someone in that pile of bodies? Just to heighten the atmosphere? 

What the hell was that bastard dreaming about? 

Gaav pushed open the big double door at the top of the stairs, and sent a ball of foxfire in to light up the area. "Fuck," he said, after peering at it for a moment. 

I had to agree with him, because it wasn't a room we were seeing. It was a cave, or maybe part of a buried ruin, since the walls were a mixture of masonry, hard-packed dirt and gravel, and some really big vines or roots. 

Behind me, Sylphiel gasped. "This is . . . the old city? The tunnels under Flagoon? But why?" 

"Well, we were underground when Lina took him down," Zelgadis said. 

"I thought he built that," the princess said. 

The chimera sighed. "It isn't as though we stopped for an inspection on the way in, and it was so much of a mess afterwards it would have been difficult to say much about what it was like at the beginning. He could have built it, using the real area as a model. He could have repurposed it. We'll never know for sure." 

"Why would it matter, anyway?" I asked, and took a step forward. 

We followed the short tunnel-hallway to another set of doors, which Gaav threw open. 

"Well, that's pretty fucking tasteless," he said after a glance around. 

"Do you really think so?" A child's voice. Maybe it was the same one that had spoken outside—how was I supposed to know? 

"It's all the glowing shit," Gaav said, walking casually into the room so that we could enter behind him. And there really was a lot of . . . glowing shit. Glowing runes up and down the walls, interrupted by vines. Glowing trim on the throne that stood on a raised mound at the center of the room, on which . . . something . . . sat. 

I couldn't even call it a figure, not really. It was a mess of several overlapping translucent images moving not-quite-in-sync. Images of a black-haired child wearing short pants, smiling cruelly, but I couldn't have told you much else about its appearance. 

"This is ironic, isn't it, Gaav? The two of us both dead because of Lina Inverse, and meeting up in Hell. I'd like to be able to tell you I brought you here, since this is supposed to be my realm, but the truth is that you barged in without my permission. You really don't have any manners, do you?" 

Gaav snorted. "Manners? What the fuck would you know about those? You think backstabbing someone while they're busy is a demonstration of good manners? I guess being canned rotted your brain." 

I don't know if Hellmaster—because this couldn't be anyone else—genuinely didn't hear that, or just decided to ignore it. "I am a bit surprised, though. I didn't know that Lina Inverse's little friends were dead. Or your dragon lover." 

_Dragon . . . lover?_

My brain sputtered to a stop. Gaav had kind of admitted to Sylphiel that he loved me, sure, but I thought he'd meant something . . . brotherly. Or even fatherly. Not sexual. But your father doesn't flirt with you the way he'd done with me a time or two on this crazy trip. Trying to re-establish the relationship without telling me about the past. 

Right now, I wasn't sure whether I wanted to try to punch him out, or hug him and apologize for being so dense and. . . what? Did I want this? Did I want him? If I didn't, could I let him go? Spend the rest of my life without that reassuring presence at my side? 

I didn't want that. Didn't want to be alone again, didn't want . . . 

I shook my head so hard I'd swear my brain rattled. This wasn't the time to be thinking about this. Not with Hellmaster in front of me. A quick glance around showed that everyone was looking at me. Princess Amelia looked like she was thinking hard, Zelgadis' mouth had thinned, Sylphiel looked sad, and Gaav . . . I wasn't sure what that expression of his was, that twist of his lips that looked like he was trying to smile. 

«Sorry, little dragon.» Much-missed voice, but I hadn't wanted to hear it under these circumstances. «I thought it would be easier to separate from you if you didn't know. Fucked up again, I guess.» 

«I . . .» I shook my head again. I honestly didn't know what to tell him. 

Gaav turned back toward Phibrizzo. "Got anything else you want to say about my personal life before I tear what's left of you to shreds and sink it in the Sea of Chaos?" 

"So angry," the child said, with a wide smile. "So hateful. How can you hurt me? We're both dead." But then an odd expression crossed its face. 

"Just realized you can't feed from me, did you? That's because _you're_ dead, you little fucker. I survived, thanks to this fucking weight Ragradia hung around my neck. You're just a shadow of the real Hellmaster. Still, it'll make me feel a lot better to fucking _kill you!_ " Gaav yelled the last two words as he lunged forward with his sword raised, eyes glowing red. 

It happened so fast, a blur of light and motion that my eyes couldn't quite follow . . . and I had a sense that what was happening on the physical plane was only part of their battle anyway. Clash and retreat and clash again . . . it felt like Gaav had the upper hand. Phibrizzo was slippery, though. It felt like he was often at the edges of the combat, trying to sneak away. And while I wasn't sure of the source of those feelings, I was sure they were more than just intuition. Training from my old life welling up from my subconscious, maybe. 

That was, I think, how I was aware of a sudden wave of invisible force shooting towards me before it hit, although I didn't notice early enough to dodge it. I certainly tried though, dropping and twisting as my heart pounded. 

I felt a splash of hot-cold agony in my left elbow, and heard a sizzling sound as I rolled three times before coming to a stop in the shadow of a large figure. 

"You okay, little dragon?" 

"Just a scratch," I growled as it sank in that Phibrizzo had deliberately attacked me in an attempt to get at Gaav. "You?" 

"I'm fine." But there was something wrong with the line of his shoulders. 

"Bullshit." I lunged to my feet and twisted around to get a better look at his front. One glance and I recoiled. Great Ceiphied, that was _not_ "fine"! His clothes had been eaten away and most of his chest seemed to be one big raw black-oozing burn, like he'd been sprayed with acid. A quick glance showed my elbow in a similar state, except that I bled red. 

He'd shielded me from that attack. And he'd taken damage from it. 

I felt a growl building in my chest. It escaped with bone-rattling force as I turned to face Phibrizzo. 

"You little _bastard_ ," I snarled, shifting my grip on my lance. "I'm going to turn you into fishmeal for that." 

«Val. Don't get carried away. You can't follow what he's doing on the astral.» 

«I'm not nearly as vulnerable to astral attacks as you are,» I argued. Gaav might be anchored to the physical in a sense, but he was fundamentally an astral being. As far as I was concerned, my body _was_ me. Little details of self-perception like that make a big difference in fluid realms like the astral. 

"Fishmeal?" Phibrizzo laughed. "How delightfully physical! Why don't you try?" He stared at me with what I could only describe as a crazed expression, all wide eyes and maniacal grin. 

"Be careful!" Zelgadis said from behind me. "He can kill you with a snap of his fingers." 

"You mean, the _real_ Phibrizzo could kill _a human_ with a snap of his fingers," I corrected, with a wide grin of my own, even though the chimera couldn't see it. "Ancient dragons are a bit more durable." There was a fire inside me, fueled by equal parts of anger and eagerness for violence. I'd never felt it so strongly before. I bared my teeth and gathered myself to lunge. «I'll distract him while you get rid of him.» I hadn't completely lost my mind. In fact, I felt intensely focused. 

This was where I was meant to be. This was _what_ I was meant to be. Fighting things so insanely powerful normal people would wet themselves just thinking about it. Because that was what I needed to provide the challenge and the knife-edge of fear that made my blood race. 

I flew toward Phibrizzo with my lance in my hands, stabbing for his heart. Assuming the little bastard had one.


	24. Chapter 23

Of the five semitransparent overlapping hands Phibrizzo raised to stop me, three of them sprouted talons which grated against my lance's blade with a terrifying noise and a shower of sparks. I was a bit surprised they were so solid, but I did my best not to show it. Instead, I brought the other blade in low and fast. Phibrizzo jumped back. 

"You're quick," he said. "I'll give you that, dragon." He was still grinning widely. I was starting to think his face was frozen that way. "But let's see how you deal with . . . this!" 

I don't know what sixth sense prompted me to jump and twist right at that moment. Something left a stinging line along the outside of my thigh. An attack channeled through the astral and back out to the physical again. This was what Gaav had been trying to warn me about. I'd just been too ignorant to listen. 

When this was over, I was going to have to somehow get him to really spar with me, using all the tricks he knew. Until now, we'd worked purely on the physical plane, and I hadn't really understood what a serious fight against a Mazoku might be like. 

I was getting a crash course now, certainly. The mess of overlapping images that represented Hellmaster in the physical were getting blurrier and messier and I couldn't afford to watch them anyway, because they didn't correspond to the attacks that were pouring in from all directions. Things came shooting out of the astral from behind, beside, above, below . . . I had to put all my effort into dodging rather than attacking, constantly in motion and hoping that I wasn't about to move into an attack instead of away from it. 

After about thirty seconds of this, Phibrizzo started to laugh. "You dance really well!" he called. "So let's up the tempo a bit!" 

_Up the . . . oh, hell . . ._ I wanted to look around for Gaav, but if I did, that would remind Hellmaster that he was there, and I couldn't take the risk. 

«Just a bit more, little dragon. He's starting to consolidate himself.» 

A bit more. Well, then. I gritted my teeth and let my wings and tail pop out and my skin scale over—the most complete transformation I could manage without also bulking myself up to dragon size, and there wasn't room for that here. Although they were primarily a physical barrier, the scales would also armour me a little against black magic. And I could move in three dimensions now, without needing to stop and channel a spell. That gave me a little more dodging room. 

Hellmaster didn't attack me during the several seconds required for my preparations, and I doubted it was out of any sense of fair play. Perhaps he wanted to show me that nothing I could do was going to help. Well, screw him. 

I flapped my wings, putting the full force of them into another forward charge, twisting as I went to avoid the attacks that shot out of the astral . . . most of them coming just a hair too late. If Hellmaster had ever fought a dragon in hybrid form before, it didn't show. Or maybe he was too out of it to adjust quickly. And I doubt he'd been expecting me to propel myself _up_ at just the right moment to give him a faceful of my tail. 

I didn't get away unscathed, mind you—my tail got sliced to the bone about a foot from the tip, and I could feel blood trickling down it. But Hellmaster's smile had disappeared, and that was something worth congratulating myself for. 

"Just as annoying as your master," he said through clenched teeth. The multiple images of his body were starting to overlap more tightly. He looked almost normal when he wasn't moving. Just a small human boy with black hair and pale eyes . . . except that no real child of that age would have had such an expression. 

He raised a hand, and the air around me seemed to deaden. As though all the energy were being sucked out of it . . . and maybe it was. Hellmaster's power was returning to him, instead of being spread out through the dimension. 

"My lord!" That was Parthus, who had been awfully quiet since we'd gotten here. "Take me back, my lord! Use me!" 

Hellmaster smiled and raised his hand. "Don't say I didn't _warn_ you," he said, sounding very much like a real child playing a game. A torrent of purple lightning shot from Parthus to that raised hand, and the lesser Mazoku's body dissolved into a stream of sparks that shot back to his master. Hellmaster giggled. His form was almost perfectly solid now, just a little blurry around the edges. 

"You value this dragon, don't you?" the creature that wasn't a child said. " _Dear_ little brother. Oops, you wanted me to forget you were there. _So_ sorry." He laughed again. It was a sound I was really beginning to hate. "Finding a way of reducing you to despair was always difficult. You're the kind to just blunder forward and kill whatever threatens you, and not care too much about the fate of your minions . . . but this one . . . And there are so many _interesting_ things inside that head of his . . ." 

Another laugh, and it was as though talons of fire suddenly dug into my brain. I gritted my teeth as the room wavered. I wouldn't drop my weapon, I told myself sternly. We were in the middle of a fight, and clawing at my head would only shred my scales without relieving the pain. I still shook my head violently, though. And I felt intensely dizzy. _Focus,_ I told myself, but everything around me was slipping and sliding and . . . where was I? I should be . . . I should be . . . 

«Val!» 

_Gaav-sama?_ But he was . . . I had . . . Hellmaster had _killed_ him, raw pain in my head oh Ceiphied oh Ruby-Eye it hurt so much . . . so much that this wasn't the first time I'd heard the phantom sound of him, in my ears or in my brain, hallucinating something that would help me handle the pain . . . the pain . . . my arm . . . I had . . . tried to wield both halves of my power, and Ragud Mezegis as well, against Xellos, and I'd lost control and now I was stuck in this damned cave trying to wrestle the dragonfire in my veins back to its quiescent state while Jillas and Gravos chased after Lina Inverse and her friends, so that they could get Gorun Nova to me and my revenge could move forward at last . . . 

There was . . . someone here? Not Jillas, but then who . . . ? That trusting idiot Almayce would have to crawl on his hands and knees to get into this area and normally stuck to the upper caverns, but . . . _Xellos?!_ Stretching out his hand . . . 

I snarled and jumped back. It would be a pleasant, sunny day over the Sea of Chaos before I let him get his hands on Ragud Mezegis! 

Something wasn't right. Why wasn't he moving? And why was the little shit holding his staff like a sword? Even he should know the difference between the two. What would he even know about using a sword? 

I had to be careful until I figured out what was going on. I shifted my grip on my lance and closed the distance between us cautiously. 

He used the staff like a sword, too, and the way my weapon slid against it was wrong. Ragud Mezegis' blades were infinitely thin and sharp and should have sheared straight through that stupid staff, but the feeling that ran up my arms suggested metal clashing against metal. 

After a quick exchange of testing blows, I stepped back again. Xellos should have pressed his advantage. He didn't, and that too was wrong. 

"What the hell is going on here?!" I snarled, and— 

The blow slammed into me from behind. I tasted blood as I hurtled through the air and smashed into stone with a child's voice echoing in my ears. 

"You're too observant for your own good, aren't you? Just like your master. Gaav's never been the _smartest_ of us, but his animal instincts are excellent." 

The full, snarling roar of an enraged dragon filled the room, and it wasn't mine. " _Phibrizzo! You little shit!_ " Coming from . . . Xellos? But the voice was wrong, the voice was . . . and the body was surging up and out, the world shattering around it until I was again in a different cave, and the weapon in my hands wasn't Ragud Mezegis (what was a Ragud Mezegis, anyway?), but the lance-form of the two swords Gaav had given me after the fight on the zombie ship. I coughed wetly, tasting blood, and something about the shifting pain inside my chest told me my ribs were busted to junk, even though I'd never had broken ribs before. It felt like something inside my head was busted to junk too, memories slipping and sliding, images flashing in front of my mind's eye and then gone again before I could fully grasp them. 

"Val-san! Are you all right?" A woman's voice . . . oh, right, Sylphiel. And Zelgadis and Amelia (fractured image of a much younger, much smaller Amelia, dressed in a white travelling outfit with pale green boots—what the hell was this stuff?) They'd come here with me—with _us_. 

"I've been better," I admitted, gritting my teeth as I pushed my way up into a sitting position. Damn, that hurt. Not the worst I'd ever had (wasn't it?), but bad enough. I was going to say something else, but at that moment, the ceiling caved in. Zelgadis cast a protective spell before anything hit us—I guess travelling with Lina Inverse had given him a lot of practice at that sort of thing—but it was startling to have huge chunks of rock nearly dropped on your head. 

The roof of the cavern had been blasted open, but there was no sky above it, just a foggy purple-grey mess. Rearing up against it was a massive three-headed red dragon. I felt a smile cross my face even though he didn't look at all happy. Because he was magnificent, and he was . . . he was . . . (slipping and sliding below the level of my conscious mind, couldn't get a grip on it . . .) 

Sylphiel had both hands on my chest and was muttering, subvocalizing the words of a Recovery spell. I really needed Resurrection, I knew, but without any living things except us to draw on in this dimension, it was likely not to have anything like its normal effectiveness. I could feel the bones of my ribcage knit together, but I knew the bond was fragile, likely to break again if I tried to move very much. Which meant I couldn't fight, and even standing up was risky. 

"Gaav," I said, craning my neck to try to get a better look around the priestess. "Is he . . . ?" 

"Angry, from the look of it," Zelgadis said. "I suppose that means he really does care what happens to you." 

Sylphiel nodded. "He cares deeply. I can tell. That part of him is . . . really human." 

I wasn't sure _human_ was the word. _Mortal_ , maybe. Fallible and . . . longing. For me. Even though I'd been alternating between clinging on and pushing him away. He had to be frustrated beyond belief (flash of his face, blue eyes burning, as I stood pinned between him and a wall, close enough to feel his breath against my skin). I shook my head, hard. "Get out of the way," I said. "I need to be able to see." _Or I'm going to get up so that I can push my way past the three of you, and damn the consequences._

"See? Oh. Oh! I'm so sorry!" Well, once she got it, at least Sylphiel moved quickly. 

Phibrizzo had become a towering black monster that still looked small beside the three-headed dragon, and they were fighting back and forth. Gaav was using his breath weapon, a deceptively slow-moving jet of redness that wasn't fire, and wherever it touched, stone puffed into nothing. And I don't mean that it was crumbling the walls of the cave, I mean that it was blowing holes in the entire dimension, so that the fog outside showed through. 

Hellmaster wasn't standing still, either. He was fighting back, slashing at the three-headed dragon with a limb that looked like it was made from black flame. His main advantage was that the difference in scale made it difficult for Gaav to get a grip on him. 

I knew I was only seeing part of the battle, though. Gaav might seem to have the advantage here, but the situation on the astral was less certain. Dropping into a trance to check on it wasn't exactly easy when I was worried and in pain, but I forced myself to regulate my breathing and let my eyes unfocus a bit, and got there somehow. 

Not that I would claim the astral was a good place to be, just then. There were a lot of energies shooting back and forth, arcing and twisting. The big red dragon was easy to spot, but his opponent was more difficult to fathom. Hellmaster's monstrous projection in the physical plane, while it didn't look human, could still be interpreted as having a torso, head, and limbs, even if the exact _number_ of limbs varied from moment to moment. The version of him on the astral was much larger and . . . well, I could only describe it as a nightmarish, amorphous blob, with black flames and multicoloured glowing bits and contours that changed from instant to instant. It made me feel nauseous. And that pissed me off and made me stare all the harder, as though I could make sense of him just by willing it hard enough. 

And that was probably why I saw it. Because all of my attention was concentrated on watching. A faint, purplish glow oozing across Phibrizzo's body in a deterministic way that looked nothing like the random wiggling of everything else except the pseudopods engaged in active combat. 

«Watch out,» I told Gaav. «He's going to try something.» 

«He's trying about eight different things,» came the reply. «Which one were you trying to warn me about?» 

«The glow that—» Suddenly the purple brightened and shot forward rapidly, aimed at Gaav's central head. There was a bright flash, and he snarled and reared back, but it didn't seem to have done any damage. Maybe it hadn't been as potent as Hellmaster had expected. 

There was another flash, but this time it came from below my line of sight . . . and from behind me, accompanied by another sharp pain in my torso. I looked right down to see . . . Ceiphied! There was a hole right through me! A couple of inches in diameter. Bleeding. 

My eyes widened, and I clapped a hand over it. It was too big for that to stem the flow of blood, though. "Recovery," I cast, and coughed, spattering the area with red. Not enough. Again. "Recovery. Recovery!" Gaav's leftmost head cast a glance in our direction, and I wondered if anyone other than me recognized his expression as one of stunned distress. 

"Recovery!" Sylphiel repeated, but we both knew I was far beyond the point where speeding up my natural healing would help. But instead of giving up, the priestess got a determined look on her face and intoned a different spell in what I thought was Elvish. I wasn't sure what it was supposed to do, because I couldn't find any difference when she was finished. Meanwhile, the princess produced some bandages somewhere and began to wrap them tightly around my torso. I didn't think either action would help, but I wasn't about to say so. 

_Weak—I'm too fucking weak!_ Anger and shame and self-disgust clawed at my insides. All familiar, and all hurting worse than the hole. 

"You son of a bitch," Gaav snarled to Phibrizzo. "A fucking jar won't do you any good this time, because I'm not going to leave enough of you to fill a _thimble_!" And he spoke a spell in old, harsh words that I didn't recognize, with different ones, overlapping, coming from all three of his mouths at once. Hellmaster went on a sudden, furious offensive, but Gaav ignored the black-bleeding furrows left in his scales to add another triple phrase to his chant, and while the atmosphere in the cave had been disturbing from the very start, it felt a lot heavier now, as though something was about to happen. 

Gaav exhaled one final word from his central head, and a whirlpool opened up underneath Phibrizzo. It was hard to tell with Hellmaster in the way, but the other side seemed to open on a swirling void of black and gold, and it began to suck Phibrizzo in. 

Hellmaster wasn't about to give in without a fight, though. He grabbed onto Gaav's rightmost head with several limbs and hung on for dear life. It didn't seem to lessen the vortex's pull on him, but I saw Gaav slide several inches toward the swirling opening, and digging in his feet was only slowing the motion, not stopping it. 

("You know I have to do this, little dragon. Xellos is deliberately stirring up shit, and he never does anything like that by accident. We need to know why." And he vanished and I waited for him to come back but he never ever did and there was a bleeding hole inside my head and I couldn't bear to leave everything unfinished but I just wanted to die . . .) 

I was moving before I realized it, lance in hand, toward the place where a pissed-off-looking Chaos Dragon was unsuccessfully trying to scrape Hellmaster off his head. I jumped onto Gaav's hindquarters and scrambled up his spine, ignoring the humans' calls to _stop_ and _come back_. Like I didn't know what I was doing to myself. I could feel the blood trickling down over my stomach and my broken ribs shifting with every desperate pumping breath, but like _hell_ was I going to stop now. _I'm not going to fail him. Not this time._

I had to straddle Gaav's neck to get close enough, feeling his muscles straining against the skin of my inner thighs. He had his talons and both his other heads in play now, slashing, biting, and grabbing, but there was just too much of Hellmaster, too many amorphous limbs . . . I wasn't sure whether I was seeing the physical or the astral, and I didn't care. I just went after the finer tendrils of black flame, which seemed to have disproportionate leverage and were hard for Gaav himself to get at. The lance flashed between my hands and bit into Hellmaster five times . . . six . . . I almost cheered when, with one more titanic heave from Gaav, Phibrizzo came loose and began the long fall away into glittering darkness. 

"Where does that go?" I asked. 

"The Sea of Chaos. The Golden One can finish chewing his ass that way." Gaav spoke through the head whose neck I'd been straddling. I could feel the vibration. "Enough about Phibby. Why the fuck did you come running over here with a hole like that in you?" 

"I admit it wasn't the brightest thing I've ever done, okay? But I couldn't bear the thought of losing you again." 

His head jerked sharply, nearly tumbling me off his neck. " _Again?_ " 

"Hellmaster broke some crap loose inside my head," I tried to explain. "Just pieces that don't connect together, but there's this one bit where I see you disappear and I know you're not coming back and it just makes me feel cold and sick inside. I don't want to be alone again." I forced myself to keep my voice level, even though I wanted to scream it in his face. The entire world seemed to be wavering around me. " . . . Shit," I muttered, and put my hand to my head. I was starting to feel woozy, but I had a feeling that if I lost consciousness, I might not wake up again. I felt myself swaying. All my strength was leaving me and I couldn't do a damned thing about it. 

"Val!" Somehow, Gaav managed to assume human form and catch me as I tumbled from his neck, landing on his feet on the ground with a hard crunch. 

"Sorry," I whispered. Just for him. I didn't want the others to hear, even as they came running toward us. 

"We need to get him back to the real world," Sylphiel said as she skidded to a stop nearby. "Recovery isn't a strong enough spell to help him, and I don't think there are enough living things here to support Resurrection." 

"We can't," Gaav said harshly. 

_What?_


	25. Chapter 24

"The moment I kicked Phibby out, this whole place came unstuck from Sairaag, and now it's falling apart," Gaav continued. "There's all kinds of shit flying around on the astral. I can't navigate. Poking a hole back through to the physical could land us anywhere. Dolphin's palace. The Overworld. In the Sea of Chaos with Phibby, even. I could survive most of those possibilities, but you couldn't, and Val . . ." His expression said everything. "We have to wait it out. A couple of hours, probably." 

"Val may not last that long," Sylphiel said, and Gaav rounded on her. 

"Do you think I don't fucking know that?! I can try to freeze him in time, but that has weird side effects sometimes if you do it to someone who can sense the astral. Or I can . . ." He grimaced and stopped talking. 

"What?" I whispered. 

"Put you back to the way you were before, little dragon." 

Someone gasped in outrage. I wasn't sure who, and I didn't care anyway. 

"With the horn," I whispered, and smiled at his expression. "I don't . . . remember everything, but I . . . don't think I was unhappy. As a Mazoku. Not when I was still with you. Only . . . after you left." It was getting hard to talk—hell, hard to breathe. I had to brace myself for each movement of my chest. 

"If you come with me this time, I promise I won't leave you alone again," he said. "If only because I'm pretty sure that if you tried to blow up the world again, you'd probably pull it off." 

Laughing hurt too. _This feels so familiar, and yet . . . not._ I should have been looking into his face from a different angle. Across, not below. 

"Please try to hang on." That was the princess. 

"I don't want to have to explain how you died to Filia." And the chimera. 

"I'll try," I whispered. "But if it gets to the point where there's no way I can make it . . . change me." I spoke the words while I was staring Gaav straight in the eye, so that he wouldn't doubt me. «I'd already more or less decided that I was going to ask to stay with you,» I added to him privately. «If it has to be as a Mazoku or whatever . . . that's okay. As long as you're there. I'm so tired of being alone in the dark with the monsters . . . » 

«Save your strength,» he told me, and slowly lowered us both so that he was sitting cross-legged and I was in his lap. One big hand intertwined itself with mine, and I was grateful, because it was warm and I was so very cold . . . I should be trying to piece together the mass of broken junk Phibrizzo had left behind in my head when he'd tried to use me to destroy Gaav, but thinking about that or anything would have taken more concentration than I could muster, so I just let myself drift. But I refused to lose consciousness. I wasn't going to leave Gaav alone either. I was afraid of what he might do, even though he'd spent the first several thousand years of his life without me. 

_Do I love you? I still don't know. So this is a selfish decision, in a way. But . . ._

I don't think the next twenty minutes or so were fun for anyone. I mean, none of us could do more than stand or sit or lie around and wait as the cave crumbled away to reveal the glowing, nonsensical misty mess that was apparently what the astral looked like when you didn't have the physical to shield you from it. I was fighting for every breath, Gaav was grimly staring at nothing, and the humans were glancing at us periodically, then away. Over time, the pain started to seem like it belonged to someone else. I was pretty sure that wasn't good, but there was nothing any of us could do about it. 

More bits of the pocket dimension fell away, and Gaav had to raise a barrier to keep the humans from being borne away by the turbulent winds that whipped at the fog without ever seeming to disperse it. 

«Is this what the astral is always like?» I asked, once again forcing myself to awareness. 

«That's like someone standing in the middle of a desert, or an ocean, and asking if this is what the physical is always like,» Gaav retorted. «There are different terrains in the astral, too. Some of them you'd interpret as dark, or shining, or bumpy, or whatever. The explanations don't translate well into physical terms.» 

«Oh.» Somehow, I could tell he was still deeply worried, so I added, «Everything's going to be fine, y'know.» 

«I'm the one who should be telling _you_ that.» 

I wanted to shake my head, but I would have needed to be able to lift it first. «You have trouble with it, don't you? This death crap. Being erased from existence isn't the same thing as dying like a mortal. For one thing, it's a lot quicker. No dramatic, prolonged dying speeches. And no grieving. You've never really had to do that, am I right?» 

«I used to think I had. Mazoku can miss the presence of someone we relied on, who belonged to our faction. But it doesn't feel like this shit. I'm supposed to be a fucking _god_ , and yet I can't even preserve the illusion of choice for one little dragon . . .» 

«Stop that,» I told him. «You're not supposed to be like this. If you start to cry, the world's probably going to end or something. And I'm going to get pissed off if you start to go all mushy on me.» 

He snorted, and a smile flickered around the corners of his mouth. «You know, if anyone else said that to me, I'd turn them into a pile of meat, or maybe a fine dusting of ash.» 

«But I'm not anyone else, am I?» 

«No, you're not. Pushy little dragon.» 

«And as for choice . . . You tried. You've done more for me than anyone else ever has, even my own parents.» Somewhere in the fractured junk of almost-memory were fragments concerning the two harried dragons who had tried and failed to understand a hatchling who had been a fighter from the very start, an anomaly among a pacifist people. They'd loved me, but channeling my fierceness was beyond them. "M'cold," I added out loud. 

Gaav made a gesture, and warmth instantly spread over me. "Best I can do, little dragon." 

"S'better," I mumbled. I was comfortable enough now that I . . . I could almost . . . Breathing was so hard, and hurt so much . . . 

"Val! Come on, Val, stay with us!" 

«I think it's time,» I told Gaav, forcing myself to focus as the world started to drift away. 

"Get back," I heard him say. Not to me, though. His hand pressed down on my breastbone, keeping me from even trying to inhale, and that actually made things easier. 

And then there was fire. 

Red burning pain exploded in my veins, as though someone was trying to make me aware of each individual blood vessel. Or maybe it was my nerves. It wasn't as though I could concentrate enough to sort out the pattern. My back arched and I gave a hoarse, involuntary cry as my mind tried to flee the agony. Scraps of information slipped and slid around, and I gasped and inhaled and buried myself deliberately in the largest one I could find— 

_. . . scowled and wondered if she was ever going to shut up. I'd been kind of glad when I'd discovered that Beastmaster hadn't sent that slick bastard Xellos as her envoy this time, but this idiot mid-ranker was worse. I gathered that she was one of those types like Mazenda who often relied on sex appeal in her dealings with mortals—that skirt was more than short enough, and she often moved in such a way as to make her breasts look like they were going to bounce right out of her deep-plunging neckline—but what had Zelas expected that was going to accomplish here? Hell, I could hear snoring, because Rashatt was pretending to have fallen asleep, and Raltaak was scribbling away on some sort of records with a quill pen that ended in a large, foofy feather. Even Gaav-sama looked extremely bored, with his chin resting on one hand and his eyes at half-mast. As for me, standing beside his throne, I couldn't see how listening to her drivel advanced any of our causes, and wished he would just send her back to Wolf Pack Island with a few holes in her._

_She approached the throne. I couldn't believe it, but she was climbing the steps and pushing herself into Gaav-sama's lap. She even had the gall to look surprised when he grabbed her throat with the hand his chin wasn't resting on and held her out so that her feet couldn't quite touch the ground._

_"You tell Zelas that I'm not her pawn and I won't play her fucking games," Gaav-sama said while the dangling Mazoku struggled—yeah, she really was quite an actress, pretending to be in fear of her life when she didn't even need to breathe. "I'm also tired of her bullshit. Now, get out of my sight." He threw her, and she hit the floor and skittered a good twenty feet before she managed to get up and limp—limp!—to the door, because Gaav-sama controlled all access to the astral from inside the room._

_Once she was gone, Gaav-sama rose from his throne and also left the room. No one but me paid much attention, because we all knew he did that sometimes. Only Raltaak and I knew where it was he went—he didn't even trust Rashatt enough to let him find out what was behind the door at the end of the hallway._

_I hesitated a moment before following him. I had the feeling that something wasn't right, but that didn't mean it was safe to act on it, and I'd been punched into a wall a couple of times for disturbing Gaav-sama at what he felt was the wrong moment. But it was that or go to my own rooms. Staying in the throne room with the other Mazoku always felt like I was trying to walk a gauntlet of arrows and sling-stones. They didn't like me, and I didn't really understand them. I was only tolerated because I was powerful and belonged to Gaav-sama._

_The door to his rooms opened to my touch, and that was a privilege even Raltaak didn't have, given to me because the nature of my unstable power meant that I sometimes had to get to Gaav-sama fast when I was in a condition that prevented me from teleporting. Gaav-sama himself was standing in the middle of the familiar front room, staring into the middle distance with his hands clenched into fists. Despite that, he didn't seem to be angry._

_"Leave," he said, but his voice sounded more strained than anything._

_"No." He . . . allowed my insolence, usually, because he saw it as strength. Proof that I wasn't afraid of him. But really, all the fear had been burned out of me when my clan had died._

_"This isn't the time, little dragon. Get out."_

_"Or you'll what?" He wouldn't kill me, I knew. As an existence capable of fighting at the same level as a General or Priest, I was too valuable._

_But when he flashed toward me and pushed me up against the wall beside the door, I almost did flinch. I stared at him with wide eyes when he forced my head back, wondering if I'd finally gone too far this time. Wondering if the death he'd postponed for me was here at last, as he leaned down so close that I could feel the heat of his breath against my skin._

_I was so fixated on the idea I was going to be punished that it took me a moment to figure out what was actually going on when Gaav-sama smashed his mouth against mine._

_Gaav-sama. Was kissing. Me._

_My eyes went even wider. Gaav-sama was kissing me and I . . . I . . . My lips parted involuntarily while my brain was still stuttering, and he took possession of the inside of my mouth as well, tongue pressing against mine._

_I'd never imagined that anything like this could possibly happen, but when it finally worked its way through my thick brain that yes, this was real, my body responded with sudden throbbing arousal and a bone-deep ache for contact. Since I had come here, hardly anyone ever touched me, and even when they did, it felt like I was touching a doll or something. Very few Mazoku bothered to endow their projections with the skin texture and body temperature of a living being. Only Gaav-sama's hands ever felt warm._

_I moaned as he nipped my lower lip, and, greatly daring, I reached for the buttons on his long yellow coat. His eyes widened slightly, but he didn't grab my wrists or even stop plundering my mouth, so I unbuttoned the coat and untied the sash and went to work on the shirt underneath, but before I could get it completely open he impatiently made both our clothes vanish._

_I'd never seen him naked before, but his body lived up to everything I'd imagined based on his frame and his strength and the way he moved and fought. Broad shoulders, solid muscle. A body built for power. The chest hair was unusual for a dragon, but it looked right on him. As did the massive erection._

_He kissed me again, forcefully, and this time, I coiled my arms around his shoulders and kissed him back. I went with him when he nudged me sideways until the arm of a leather-upholstered couch was pressing against my leg, but I growled at him when he tried to tumble me over that arm. He chuckled, and his eyes narrowed and sharpened as they often did when he fought. Which gave me just enough warning to brace myself when he grabbed me by the upper arms with bruising force and pushed me down. I struggled, but couldn't get loose. So I bit him._

_«Does that mean you want me to stop?» he whispered in the inner recesses of my mind._

_«Does this feel like I want to stop?» I retorted, and rubbed my erection against his thigh. «It's just that the arm of this stupid couch is biting into my back.»_

_Gaav-sama laughed, and suddenly we were in an unfamiliar bedroom instead—his bedroom, it had to be. And I was sprawled on black silk sheets on an unmade bed, still underneath him, with my arms pinned. There was a spark in his eyes that I'd never seen before as he gave me a raking look that took in everything from my horn to my crotch. Then he lowered his head and very deliberately bit me too, teeth breaking the skin over my collarbone and releasing a few drops of deep red for him to lap away._

_He licked and sucked his way down my chest to a nipple, and paused there for a moment to tease it with his lips and tongue, and I groaned as the sensation woke an echo lower down. From there, he trailed kisses and nips down over my stomach. When he got below my navel, instead of doing what I wanted him to do, he pressed his face into my crotch and inhaled. Smelling me. It was a very physical, very earthy thing to do, and it startled me a bit, because Mazoku were creatures of the astral. I wasn't just surprised that he'd want to do such a thing, I was surprised it had even occurred to him._

_I wasn't going to ask why, though. It didn't take a genius to see that it wasn't an appropriate question, and anyway, the "why" I most cared about at the moment was why he was ignoring my cock. He didn't even pay it any attention when it left a sticky line of fluid near his ear as he adjusted his angle so that he could lick my balls . . . and further back from there . . ._

_I didn't figure out what he was doing until something hot and wet and squirming was starting to push its way into my asshole. I felt a reflexive flicker of disgust, even though I knew the opening hadn't been used for its intended purpose since that night in the desert. Nearly a hundred years ago now. It was as clean as any other part of my body. Or as dirty._

_And then his tongue was much too large to fit inside a human mouth, surging deeper inside me until the tip stabbed against something that made me see stars. I would have come, but his fingers pinched my cock right at the root and halted the eruption as he continued to lick even deeper . . . oh Ceiphied and Ruby-Eye . . . his tongue had to be expanded almost to full dragon-size now, wet and hot and stretching me mercilessly until I ached inside. I was lying in a Dark Lord's bed with him eating me out and I could feel something build in the back of my throat until it blasted out as a full-formed mating cry. I could feel myself flushing—I hadn't even known I could do that in small-form! But Gaav-sama just laughed, with his tongue still buried inside me._

_«In a hurry, little dragon? Don't worry, I won't leave you unsatisfied.» And stretched me a little wider yet and then stopped at that size, his hand stroking my belly, tracing the scars there, as the ache slowly faded._

_When he withdrew his tongue, he did it all at once, letting it shrink back down to its human size. Suddenly I was empty and aching and he was rising above me, lifting my hips to give himself a better angle to thrust forward._

_His cock wasn't as long as his tongue, but it was a little thicker, and I whined as he bottomed out inside me, because he was pressing against that spot again, although not in quite the same way. I wanted to wrap my legs around him and just hold him there, but the angle was bad and he was too strong for me anyway. He pulled out and thrust back in, setting a quick pace, and I didn't complain because I'd been hanging right on the edge of coming for what felt like forever and being fucked hard and fast was just exactly right._

_I didn't manage to keep up with him for long. He was still thrusting hard when I vented another involuntary mating cry and came, splattering us both with ropes of thick, white jizz. He growled softly and sped up the motions of his hips even more, but also I felt . . . hell, I wasn't quite sure what that was. A touch inside of me somehow, and I didn't mean inside my ass. It felt almost like it was inside my brain. The lightest brush of something powerful and fierce that was trying very hard not to hurt me while showing me a kind of pleasure I had never experienced before. Something on the astral._

_Was that how Mazoku made love? Were Mazoku even_ capable _of making love? I'd never even considered it until just now. The touch shivered along my nerves, slow and smooth, like the feeling of his tongue lapping at my balls. It wasn't arousing as such, though. A separate kind of pleasure. And I was enjoying it languidly when I felt him stiffen and come copiously inside me._

_He remained in position for a moment, bowing his head forward so that his hair fell into his eyes. If we ever did this again (would we? Or was this some kind of weird one-time thing? Did I want to do this again?), I wanted to play with that hair._

_When he finally looked at me, he had an expression on his face that I could only interpret as uncertain. Which was weird. I'd never known him to look like he was out of his depth before, even when I knew he actually was._

_I offered him a lazy smirk. "We're going to have to work on the foreplay a bit," I said, and a hint of tension went out of his shoulders. "Not that I have much basis for comparison." I made sure I had my eyes fixed on his before adding, "No one ever wanted me before." Trying to reassure him that although I'd never in my wildest dreams considered he might want me in his bed, I was quite happy to find myself here._

_He rocked back on his heels, pulling his softening cock out of me. "I didn't want to fuck up your relationships with the others even worse by making them think I brought you here for this, but when that stupid bitch Zelas sent started throwing herself at me, all I could think of was you." He cleansed both our bodies with a wave of his hand and laid down beside me, curling his body around mine. I smiled at the warmth of it and picked up his hand, placing it on my stomach._

_"That almost sounds like you've been considering this for a while." I cuddled in closer to him a bit, and just let the touch-hunger I'd been suffering for what felt like forever dissolve._

_"Guess so. Back when we first met and you fell flat on your face trying to tear my throat out, I felt something inside me go_ fzzt _. Took me a long time to figure out what it meant, though."_

_"'Fzzt'?" I started to laugh. I couldn't help it._

_"What?" Gaav-sama growled._

_"It's just the first time I've ever heard anyone use 'fzzt' to mean 'I want to have sex with that person.'"_

_"So maybe that's why it took me so fucking long to figure it out."_

_"Maybe." His biceps was in just the right position for me to use it as a pillow. A really firm one, maybe, but that wasn't so bad._

_"Going to sleep?"_

_"Maybe not all the way to sleep, but . . . can we stay like this for a little while?"_

_"Why not? It isn't like I have anywhere I need to be."—_

Memory tore at that point, and I was back lying across Gaav's lap in the middle of a disintegrating pocket dimension. My forehead ached, and I was gasping like a landed fish, but at least I no longer felt like someone had been trying to stir-fry my internal organs, and I was pretty sure I wasn't bleeding anymore. 

I reached up to touch my forehead, and immediately grimaced. "Did you have to put the horn back?" 

"Your body insisted on it," Gaav rumbled. "It was almost like you _wanted_ the fucking thing, but I guess not." 

"Well, I guess I can live with it." I sat up and stretched, a little gingerly—some primitive part of my brain still didn't understand that I was healed. 

"Val-san . . ." the princess said, then stopped. "Are you . . . all right?" 

I shrugged. "Bit of a headache. Other than that, I feel fine." Well, all right, so long as I treated the spike bush of Mazoku power that had just been planted inside me with respect, but that seemed almost second nature. Probably the method was buried somewhere in the shattered fragments of memory still wandering around inside my head. Which reminded me . . . 

I tilted my head up so that I was looking Gaav straight in the eyes again. And then I leaned up and kissed the corner of his mouth. 

" _Perfectly_ fine," I purred, and tried not to laugh at his expression.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to write their first encounter with Gaav as the aggressor for once, even though doing that opens up an immense can of worms about authority and consent. Hopefully it came out okay.


	26. Epilogue

We left Sairaag on a sunny day, just the two of us. The princess, the chimera, and Sylphiel all needed to spend a few more days in the city to deal with personal or diplomatic obligations, but _we_ didn't have any. So we quietly headed out the gate the morning after we escaped Phibby's private little dimension. 

We didn't know where we were going—or more accurately, we hadn't made a decision yet. The world's a big place, and we were hoping to get thoroughly enough lost in it that we wouldn't have to deal with other Mazoku for a while. 

Funny, how it came so easily to me to think of myself as a Mazoku. Settling back into half-remembered old thought patterns, I guess. Although the shards Phibrizzo had broken loose in me, stained with old guilt and hatred, still didn't seem entirely real. Most of them felt like they'd happened to someone else. Only the ones that had to do with Gaav felt like they had any substance. 

I'd thought about that in the middle of the night, as I lay by a Dark Lord's side, listening to him breathe. Memories at a distance because I wasn't that person anymore? The guilt inside me fading because now I had enough information to really understand who "Valgaav" had been? And Gaav . . . The best I could come up with was that the memories concerning him were more real because he'd been right beside me for a while now. Trying to reconnect with me. And succeeding, I had to admit. 

There was a definite feeling of . . . of lust, I guess, hanging between us now, although we'd both been too tired to act on it last night even if we hadn't been sharing a room with Zelgadis. But as the city of Sairaag dwindled in the background, I found myself sneaking sidelong glances at him, and a couple of times, I caught him shooting them at me. 

That continued until about mid-morning, when we found a side-trail, really just a narrow path of beaten earth, leading away from the main road, and Gaav turned down it. I shrugged and followed him, because I didn't really care where we went. And followed him again when he stepped off the path and led me along a narrow ravine, past the shoulder of a hill. 

The ravine curved to our left, then dead-ended at a wall of earth and rock with a narrow trickle of water flowing down it into a puddle that didn't make it very far along the ravine before evaporating. 

I raised an eyebrow at Gaav. I mean, I couldn't believe he'd made a wrong turn, but there was absolutely nothing here. Well, okay, the trickle of water and a boulder a bit more than waist-high on me, but there was nothing interesting about either of those. 

«I just wanted somewhere private, little dragon.» 

I could only think of one reason for that. My mouth went dry as my cock came to attention. 

«Here?» My voice couldn't crack telepathically, thank Ceiphied. Part of me was very sure I wanted this. Another part was a nervous virgin who was afraid it wouldn't be like the memories that didn't quite feel like mine. 

«Why not? We don't have to, but we've both been thinking about it all morning.» 

"And you've been waiting for an awfully long time for me to get my head out of my ass," I said out loud. 

"That doesn't mean I'm going to force you to put out for me." 

And he could, I knew he could. I could feel the knot of Mazoku power inside me, still his as much as it was mine. He could make me do whatever he wanted. But he wouldn't, because he liked the fact that I had my own mind, my own desires and priorities. 

I looked at him. Brought up my memories—my own memories, not Valgaav's—of what he'd looked like naked, at the pirate base so long ago. Yes. Yes, I did want a piece of that. And the nervousness would go away soon enough. 

"I just don't want gravel ground into my dick," I drawled, smirking at him. 

Gaav laughed. "I admit, you're a lot more fun when it's in working order." He was looking at the tent in my pants, the son of a bitch. And I couldn't even get him back by staring at the one in his—I was sure he had one, but his long coat hid it. 

"So what are we waiting for?" I asked, and stretched up to kiss him. 

He leaned down and met me in mid-stretch, mouth covering mine, tongue sliding past my lips to probe inside. And it was just as good as the fantasies I'd been entertaining all morning. Strange-familiar taste, indescribably and distinctly him. I memorized it so that I would never forget it again, even after another reincarnation. 

When our mouths parted, I looped my arms over his shoulders, and he got a grip near my waist and lifted me off my feet. I laughed incredulously, and then moaned as he bit lightly at my neck, now at a perfect level for him to do so. 

I wrapped my legs around his hips and ground our bodies together. I might not be able to see his cock yet, but I could certainly feel the hardness of his erection, even through the several layers of clothes that separated us. 

Gaav made a soft rumbling noise in his chest. More of a thrum than a growl, it was the sound of a dragon trying to make another of his own kind acknowledge his dominance. I trilled a reply, almost without thinking, and ground against him again. His thrum became a chuckle as he set me down on that convenient boulder and untied my belt. 

«Just a little longer,» he told me, shucking his sword harness and coat off. I was right: someone had pitched a really impressive tent in his pants. I smirked and reached over to fondle it, getting my hands tangled with Gaav's as he reached down to unlace himself. «Or maybe more than a bit longer, if you want to play with it that badly.» 

«What if I want you to play with mine?» I threw at that grin of his. 

I should have known better. Suddenly I had the sensation of a hot, wet tongue licking up the underside of my erection, although there was nothing actually there. Gaav's grin widened even more as he finished opening the front of his trousers. Meanwhile, I was biting my lip to keep from moaning too loudly, because that phantom tongue knew exactly where to tease me. It probed the slit at the tip of my cock, and the light breeze outlined every drop that leaked from me as a result with a hint of cold. 

«Ah, fuck it. You've never had anyone inside you in this lifetime, and I do _not_ want to spend twenty minutes stretching you. So . . .» He leaned down and kissed me, and the phantom tongue that had been teasing at my cock was replaced with a combination of textures, slick and satin and rough, as he pressed our erections together and enfolded them in his hand. I trilled and pumped my hips. 

I also reached out to him on the astral—instinctively, not quite understanding what I was doing, only knowing that I wanted him to feel good too. I felt something against my hand—or my mind? Gaav's entire body twitched, his eyebrows flicked up, and he started thrumming again. So I did the same thing again, or tried to. It was pretty difficult with him stroking my cock. Hell, it was getting difficult to concentrate on anything except his touch. Somehow he was managing to touch all the right spots just so . . . Damn, how did he do that? Just the least brush of roughness along the shaft, when we were both so slick. _So good . . ._ I could feel pressure building in my balls, pushing up until I screamed and came. Gaav's cock rubbed slickly against mine for a moment more before he growled in satisfaction and left us both even stickier. 

We both stayed frozen there for a moment, looking at each other, before Gaav grinned his familiar evil grin and said, "When did you turn into a screamer?" 

I scowled. "If you don't like it, next time don't spend hours pretending not to build the mood." 

The Dark Lord laughed. "Fine, I'll just drag you into the bushes the moment we leave town from now on, then. Or take an inn room for just the two of us, and soundproof it, until we decide where to set up our next base." 

"We? I'm surprised you care about my opinion." 

"I always have, little dragon. Couldn't always show it, though." He waved his hand, and suddenly we were both clean again. "I'm enjoying the view, but you'd better pack yourself up—we have a lot more walking to do today." 

I sighed and packed myself back inside my trousers. "The low profile thing again? I thought we were done with that." 

"Not for a very long time . . . but it isn't so bad when you're doing it with me." 

I snorted, but secretly, I was happy. Incredibly happy. Because I could imagine a future walking by his side, and it wasn't dark and it didn't hurt. 

I was home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's it for this one. I'm currently trying to proofread a different 'fic—more than twice the length of this one—for continuity, so expect to see that one posted in the near future.


End file.
